


Shiver

by sigo



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Armitage Hux & Phasma Friendship, Armitage Hux Has Issues, Armitage Hux is Not Nice, Armitage Hux needed a hug as a child, Blow Jobs, Creepy Kylo Ren, Darth Tantrum and his Evil Space Ginger, Eventual Smut, Female Knights of Ren, First Meetings, Force Shenanigans, Hand Jobs, Hux has cosmic bad luck, Idiots in Love, Injured Armitage Hux, Kylo Ren Has Issues, Kylo Ren is Not Nice, M/M, Possessive Kylo Ren, Pre-Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Protective Kylo Ren, Scenting, Semi-Public Sex, That's Not How The Force Works, The Force Does Not Ship It but Kylo is stubborn, The KOR are wlw mlm solidarity, The Midnight Sun, The knights are lesbians
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:34:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 30,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25776727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sigo/pseuds/sigo
Summary: Kylo looked up at the redheaded man who approached the head of the table right beside him, and heard nothing in his mind. He saw nothing beneath the surface, no churning worries or last minute notes for this briefing swirling in the air. Kylo blinked, as if his eyes tricked him and he would find there was actually no one there. The man remained, solid and real. He had a handsome face, even with his brilliant hair slicked back from it severely, as though flattening it would dull the eye-catching color. Kylo got only eerie silence from where he stood.Once Kylo concentrated, though, he could make out the shape of him like a photo negative. The Force shimmered around him, lighting up every other presence in the room like beacons, even the knights, but his Force signature was absent. Kylo had never encountered anything like this before. He knew what needed to happen now. He must kill this man.
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Kylo Ren
Comments: 55
Kudos: 317





	1. First Sight

**Author's Note:**

> Hello folks, more coming soon. I don't have any trigger warnings for this one yet as I think the violence warning covers it, I will indicate in later chapters' notes if that changes.

Upon arrival, Kylo Ren was impressed by this particular star destroyer no more than any other. He’d been entranced by ships of all types, once, exploring anywhere without and within them he was welcome. Sometimes he stretched the definition of welcome, if he found a craft particularly interesting. Piloting and maintaining his own ship had enraptured him in a past life. He’d be lying if he denied a shred of that past self remained -- the _Silencer_ was built to his specifications, and he adored her.

But for a fleet flagship, the _Finalizer_ was underwhelming. How did it differ from any of the other massive arrowhead crafts of the First Order? It was big. They all were. But the halls were monotonous. This could be any of the other destroyers in the fleet: they all operated in the same way, under the watch and hands of scurrying officers who all dressed and thought and felt the same. Kylo had ceased in the year prior truly delving into the minds of the Order personnel around him unless he needed to. He just gave their thoughts the slightest touch as he passed, like sliding his fingertips light along the durasteel walls of the corridors he haunted, verifying their incredible mediocrity. Their connections to the Force babbled around him like a rushing stream, the essence of their very lives unknown and unusable to them. Open to him. He waded by, something dark and dangerous that they skirted instinctively, knowing in the base of their skulls that it was better to avoid him. It was not enough. No measure they could take aboard this ship would ensure their safety from the likes of him.

It was purgatory, Kylo thought, to be stationed on these tiresome ships amongst tiresome people, their ambitions so below his own. The simple truth that each one of these soldiers was necessary to his goals rankled him. But wars were not fought and won by a man alone, no matter how powerful. Snoke’s counsel was correct in that. In most things, Kylo righted himself. And Snoke’s counsel now brought Kylo here, to work beside the Order’s General.

Kylo was on his way now to join a briefing the man would lead, their first meeting. With any luck he’d be tolerable. Even Darth Vader had maintained an effective allyship with Grand Moff Tarkin. Kylo consoled himself with the knowledge that his grandfather, also, had needed to rely on the Empire.

And at least for today, Kylo still had the knights with him, who understood the Force. They made a foreboding presence together, helmeted and black-robed and walking in sync. Their thoughts he frequently avoided out of courtesy rather than distaste; the knights were not so proficient in mind-reading as he was, and it felt unfair to know their every whim. Kylo had particular skill in the mental puncture of skulls, something he was proud of. It came naturally and in his youth had been completely uncontrolled, the minds of the sentients around him crowding out his own thoughts until he feared he had none. Careful practice had allowed him to keep his distance, to keep his head. The knights assumed a lack of privacy in his company and rarely worried about intrusion, but Kylo gave them what distance he could.

Still, their minds were familiar to him. Vicrul’s was a stagnant pool with few surprises. She was the least trained in the Force, but vicious. Her partner Trudgen was still fuming over the fight she’d lost with Ushar last night -- it would take all of Tru’s patience to wait until their free hours for a rematch in one of the Finalizer’s gyms. Hearing Tru’s thoughts, at least, never felt like a breach, because she never thought anything she wouldn’t say out loud at the first opportunity. Her mind was a glass lake with no shadows.

Ushar was suffering, as she always did surrounded by this many Force nulls she was not allowed to touch. Her connection to the Force was the darkest of all the knights, blacker and more sickly-sweet. It festered, the pull of the Dark all-consuming. She nearly always wanted to feed it, and it had been weeks now since she’d ripped a soul from the galaxy. Kylo could sympathize. They all knew the pull of the Dark, the sacrifices it demanded in whispered tones.

Kuruk was tuned in to Ushar, their link flaring bright. Kuruk was the most solitary, a sniper, and Kylo’s closest friend. She was the most gifted in foresight, something Kylo struggled with. Sometimes it seemed her visions were more real to her than the passing of the day. She was more at ease, too, every eventuality spooling out in front of her. She and Ushar were a study in the attraction of opposites.

Kuruk reached out to Kylo now, Ushar the subject, _What do you think? Will she make it?_

Kylo tried to sample the searing rage in Ushar’s mind without taking it into himself, drawing back when the bloodlust she felt gripped him. _She’ll be fine_. As if he were the one attuned to the future.

_Okay. Thanks._

Kylo didn’t respond. What would he have said? ‘No problem?’ He didn’t enjoy tuning in to Ushar’s struggles with the Dark. He felt that even the briefest connection with her slackened his own tremulous hold on himself. There was peril in slipping too far to either side, wisdom in the pursuit of balance. The frozen Dark offered strength and acceptance, but it was also hungry. If any of them lost their footing they would not surface from that cold night-ocean again. Kylo would not risk it with his destiny unfulfilled.

Kylo and his knights entered the appointed conference room, a setting that each of them felt misplaced in. They took the seats left open for them, Kylo on the far end of the long metal table. The officers seated nearest to them leaned away almost imperceptibly, reacting and adjusting to the danger in the room without knowing it consciously. Even with their dulled senses, they felt the threat. Kylo and the Knights of Ren were more lethal than five rathtars would be in their place. The dull roar of the officers’ thoughts all speaking at once surrounded Kylo.

A blond officer leaned down across the table to talk to his mousy friend, and the vent behind him caught his scent and brought it to the knights. Kylo was used to the reaction now -- the way his throat seemed to go achy and dry as if he was fevered, the hollow yearn in the center of his chest below his sternum, the automatic tightening of his muscles that urged him to take some action and dispel the tension he felt. Scent, like all other instincts in Force Users, was heightened. In the way that Kylo could see the images and hear the words coursing through the minds of the people around him, he could smell them too. Emotions, sort of. Hormone fluctuations, what they’d had for breakfast still on their breath, the sweat and musk on their skin and the type of blood rushing beneath. It was primal, this scenting, and discouraged by the Jedi. Foolish, to try and tamp down on this well of information. Dangerous, to indulge it overmuch. The scent of blood, for example, reliably induced a frenzy in Ushar. A tiny hiss of static escaped her helmet now at this stimulus.

Kylo tuned in to Ushar’s mind again, offering his own will, and she grabbed hold. Kylo could see in her mind that she was imagining drawing her weapon and leaping across the table, imagining the hot flow of this officer’s pulse within his throat, how his blood would look spilling from him once she’d severed his head. A gift for the void, offered for no personal gain. The officer had done nothing against their cause and nothing to displease her other than to exist in the wrong place at the wrong time. Kylo shuddered despite himself at how far gone Ushar was, how close she teetered toward absolute chaos. He steadied her, and the urge passed.

_Sorry_.

_You weren’t going to, I could see it_ , Kuruk said. A lie, Kylo knew, but he said nothing to dispel the comfort it brought Ushar. Without his intervention the scene would have played out exactly as Ushar imagined it. They needed a proper fight soon, a way to appease the monster without damaging their own cause. It was getting too risky to keep Ushar penned up. Kylo was stuck here, but perhaps he’d send the rest of them off to some rebel-aligned planet to slake their blood-thirst. He could hold out longer, if need be. He worked closer to the Light than they did. He ran through a list of potential sites in his mind. The sudden sound of the conference room’s door opening and sliding shut again interrupted his silent calculations. Without the sound, Kylo would have missed the entrance of the newcomer entirely.

Kylo looked up at the redheaded man who approached the head of the table right beside him, and heard nothing. He saw nothing beneath the surface, no churning worries or last minute notes for this briefing swirling in the air. Kylo blinked, as if his eyes tricked him and he would find there was actually no one there. The man remained, solid and real. He had a handsome face, even with his brilliant hair slicked back from it severely, as though flattening it would dull the eye-catching color. High cheekbones, full lips. Pale skin. Pallid, really. He’d been a long time beneath artificial lights. When had he last seen the sun of any planet? He would probably freckle under the planetbound light of a star. Kylo still could not hear this man. He got only eerie silence from where he stood.

This stranger would be easy to miss, if Kylo weren’t looking for him. He could slip by completely unnoticed. Once Kylo concentrated, though, he could make out the shape of him like a photo negative. The Force shimmered around him, lighting up every other presence in the room like beacons, even the knights, but his Force signature was absent. Kylo had never encountered anything like this before. The space where the mundane presence of another Force null should be unnerved Kylo, and his turmoil was beginning to border on panic. What if it all went away? What if something was wrong with Kylo, some mental decline that would rip his abilities away from him? He had no value without what he could do. He made eye contact with the man through his visor. In especially tough cases, that helped. Just like this stranger’s mind, his eyes were impenetrable. Two green chips of ice, opaque like a glacier. His soul was void, cold like a shadow. A shadow where the heat of a human body should be.

Was this some specter? He didn’t have the glow of a ghost, but… Kylo breathed in deeply, uncaring of the sound his helmet made with his respiration. The man’s scent hit him like a plasma bolt at point blank range. For a long moment Kylo was too stunned to pick it apart, his own pulse thudding in his ears. If he’d known this existed in all the universe, he’d have abandoned everything he knew to search for it long ago. He’d have scoured the galaxy for it. There was precious little personal information here. This man was thorough in his bathing, but the hint of his natural scent that shone through made Kylo feel as though he were breathing flame. And _enjoying_ it. It was maddeningly stifled by the man’s thorough hygiene. And the cigarras he smoked, the hint of caf he’d drunk earlier, some vaguely floral cologne. What Kylo would give to remove those distractions.

At the same instant that Kylo picked up the man’s scent and his body reacted to it -- hormones, nothing but hormones that played well with Kylo’s own, he tried to tell himself, as if any explanation dampened the intensity of the result -- the Force reared its head like a poisonous serpent, awakening, interested. _That one_ , it whispered. The sound was not the clattering of insect wings or the tinny squeak of frost building on a corpse, the voice of the Dark. It was the warm voice of a friend. The Light had never before requested a sacrifice, and Kylo’s carefully-built tolerance for the whims of the Dark were no help to him here. Kylo clenched his hands into fists beneath the table, the cord of every muscle in his body strained to snapping. He was transformed from man to predator, ready to spring. Bloodlust came over him in a thick haze, making Ushar’s condition feel trite.

He knew what needed to happen now. He must kill this man.

The officers in the room would not tolerate a sudden execution, no matter what level of authority Snoke’s name gave Kylo. Kylo Ren was yet unknown to them. This man was known. The stripes on his uniform and the seat he took at the head of the table indicated his high rank. There were eighteen soldiers here, and four knights, and then Kylo and his quarry. The knights would spring into action if Kylo did. Kylo could draw the lock on the door, wrenching the metal bolt within shut using the Force. No one would escape. So much carnage, though...enough to break the Order’s ties with Snoke? And then what of the war? Of _Skywalker_?

Kylo kept breathing, inhaling fire that raced through his veins and made his heart pound. He wanted to rip his helmet off and kiss the man in front of him. He wanted to snap his neck. He did neither. He felt Kuruk observing him in alarm. Different visions were racing through her head, he knew, as he changed his mind over and over in agony.

The Force beckoned, making promises it didn’t intend to keep. Kylo shoved it down with great effort, only succeeding once he imagined his own face as it would be should he complete this errand. His eyes would glow yellow and the whites would burst with blood, the veins all over his body standing out dark under his skin. _You don’t use me. I use you_. He snarled at it in his mind. Even as he cursed himself for cowardice, Kylo wanted to run. He wanted to stand and flee, but feared that even the action of standing would prompt him to commit the slaughter the Force demanded.

This man’s blank emptiness where thoughts should be, in combination with the fatal attractiveness of his scent, made Kylo’s skin prickle with hate. Why did he exist? Why was he here? Simply to torment Kylo? He was thin beneath his coat, his uniform tailored to his waist. Skinny. _Frail_. Kylo hated him with the fervor he hated Ben Solo.

He could not kill this officer here. Perhaps after...Kylo could ask to accompany him to his post to observe the workings of the ship. No one could refuse him, truly. He was here on the orders of their benefactor. He could find a secluded spot... _make_ a secluded spot, send anyone headed their way running back where they’d come from, certain they’d forgotten something. He could drag this fragile, thin man into a supply closet and have his way with him. A slow death to appease the Force for waiting, no reason to rush through the experience. Perhaps his scent would be stronger beneath that uniform. Kylo could bury his face in his skin and inhale as his body went cold. One missing man was not the problem that a room of vivisected officers would be. Yes, perfect. That was the responsible way to deal with this.

“Thanisson, to your seat now please,” the man barked, his voice thick with an Imperial accent just a touch too heavy to be genuine.

The blond man who had so tantalized Ushar (it seemed a joke now in the face of Kylo’s temptation) trotted to his place along the table and sat, his face red with embarrassment at having been called out by name.

The bane of Kylo’s existence continued, his voice softened almost imperceptibly, returning to professional calmness instead of annoyance. “I’d like for everyone to welcome our newcomers.” He didn’t bother to point out the knights. Their difference from the rest of the crew was glaring. “We’ve not yet had the chance for introduction. I am General Hux.” This last he addressed directly to Kylo, seeing rightly that he was the leader, the lord to whom half of his power was being transferred.

Kylo’s plan shattered like old-fashioned glass tossed from a great height. Exploded into powder. Here was the General who led the forces Kylo needed to take the galaxy by storm, the man whom he was supposed to serve beside, counseling and protecting each other. General Hux would never need protection from anything more than he needed it from Kylo Ren.

Hux was waiting, looking at Kylo warily. Waiting for him to say something in return, Kylo realized. “Thank you,” he said lamely, grateful that the vocoder in his helmet masked any wavering in his voice. Anything else he might have said stuck in his throat as he inhaled again and his brain screamed at him to either possess or destroy. _Perhaps both_ , suggested the Force coyly.

When it became apparent that Kylo was done speaking, Hux moved on, outlining the agenda and moving through the points with clipped efficiency. At least it seemed this meeting would not drag on. Kylo tried to ease his torture by diving into the minds around him. The one called Thanisson was hardly paying attention, excited about the prospect of trading a box of Naboo Blue cigarettes for half a bottle of Corellian brandy within the alcove of an unused viewport just after this engagement was done. He was going to use the brandy to try and entice the man he’d just spoken to into hanging out after their shifts.

Thanisson’s friend, who Kylo learned was named Mitaka, was actually focusing. And this was interesting, because the man was focused more on Hux than on the content being discussed. Mitaka thought that Hux was rather beautiful in addition to the respect he held for him, and Kylo felt the urge to hoist the man up by his lapels with the Force for those thoughts. Particularly when his fantasies edged toward the romantic. It was ridiculous, really. As though Kylo himself hadn’t been fantasizing of dismembering Hux in a nearby supply closet at the first opportunity. Mitaka’s rapt observation of the General’s wrists was tame by comparison, and it shouldn’t set Kylo off like it did. Mitaka wasn’t even wrong; Hux did have nice wrists, flashing pale between black glove and sleeve when he gestured as he talked. Did everything about Hux have to look so damn delicate? Kylo could snap those wrists with one hand. Pushing a smidge further into Mitaka’s mind reassured Kylo that Hux wasn’t involved with him. It was just idle infatuation. Kylo squeezed his fists tight and released them. What did he care who Hux was involved with? Oh but he did care. He did.

Hux adjourned the meeting. Kylo hadn’t heard a word, but he knew because the officers relaxed, starting to get up and stretch and converse with each other. Hux turned to him, fixing his pale green eyes on Kylo’s helmet again. “We should meet privately, Lord Ren. At your earliest convenience.”

“I agree,” Kylo rumbled without inflection through his vocoder. It was the right response. They were meant to work together, and Snoke would want to know how Kylo felt on the matter. Kylo’s stomach sank as he thought about it. What would he tell his Master? ‘I’m sorry, can you send anyone else? I want to murder him. Badly.’ Kylo burned with shame at the thought of failure. The thought that he could not reign himself in even as much as Ushar routinely did. Begging for reprieve from Snoke was not an option. Replacing the General with another man would not be easy, either. Kylo cleared that option away, discounting it entirely. Even if Hux was removed from his side Kylo would never forget him. Better to keep him close, agony that it was. Perhaps with proximity Kylo would find where Hux secreted his thoughts away, dispelling that mystery like a bad dream.

Hux was waiting, and Kylo realized he meant now. No, Kylo couldn’t face this now. Standing alone in a room, likely a smaller one, with Hux for any length of time was unthinkable. Kylo would rip into his throat with his teeth. The Force rejoiced at the prospect.

“I must attend to my knights. I will contact you.” Kylo rose from the table, the knights rising in sync with him.

A line appeared between Hux’s eyebrows, a break in the veneer his face had been while he addressed the room at large. Kylo didn’t need to see his thoughts to know he didn’t appreciate that answer. No matter. Kylo swept from the room, trying not to inhale again before he reached the relative safety of the hallway.

_My quarters,_ Kylo thought at his knights, eager to move on before Hux could follow them out here.

Once he was safely sealed in his own room -- how safe was it? Did the General have an override? -- Kylo ripped his helmet off, gasping at the slightly stale recycled air as though it were a fresh and soothing breeze.

Ushar removed her helmet next, her face angry and pained. “What happened to you?” She demanded. Kylo was frequently her grounding point. Losing that while surrounded was hard, Kylo realized. He’d been too focused on himself to see it. Seeing the bewildered expression on his face, Ushar’s softened to a slight scowl. She shook out her long mahogany curls, damp with sweat from her helmet, and started undoing the braid that was coming apart anyway.

Kuruk was next, her face a balm. She looked at him kindly, her dark almond eyes sympathetic beneath her cropped black hair. She knew more than the others did, having seen every course of action he considered. She knew what was coming. She didn’t fully understand what had passed, of course. “Master?” She asked, “What did you see? He’s… dangerous to us? You aren’t leaving.”

Kylo had considered that too, briefly, and she’d seen it. “No,” He sighed, his mouth twitching in distaste. “I’m not leaving.” _I won’t run_ . “I don’t know what risk he poses. I can’t read him.” He felt the knights’ resounding shock at that admission. Then, a glutton for punishment, he asked Kuruk, “What did _you_ see?”

Kuruk shared, projecting the images in her own mind to each of the others’. Kylo entered Hux’s office, each detail of it arranged just the way it was in reality, Kylo knew. Kuruk’s visions were never wrong. They only fluctuated as the present changed. Hux stood as Kylo entered, coming out from behind his desk, his face carefully arranged into neutrality just as it had been when he’d led the briefing this morning. Kylo walked too close, threatening, looming, and Hux rose to the challenge, glaring up their slight height difference, not taking even a half-step back. If he knew what Kylo was plotting he’d draw his weapon. But he didn’t. There was little reason to suspect this. They were meant to work together.

By the time Hux realized the danger it was too late. Kylo held him fast, gloved hands heavy on his arms, gripping them enough to bruise. Blood pooling beneath the surface where the tissues were damaged. Blood rushing in his throat, faster as his pulse increased. Kylo could hear it. He drew Hux in flush against himself, holding him there with one arm around him. He gripped the red hair at the back of Hux’s head with the other, pulling back to bare his throat, and buried his face there. He could feel the heat of Hux’s skin, the racing pulse just below the pale barrier, so easily torn asunder. The monster inside Kylo was frenzied, egging him on. Kylo licked a trail along Hux’s jaw, and felt the man shudder with revulsion. Hux squirmed, trying in vain to fight back. He got a hand to his blaster and Kylo shorted it, tearing it apart with the Force. In the next instant Kylo’s face was on fire -- Hux had a knife up his sleeve, and he’d used it. Kylo released him to instinctively clasp his hands to his bleeding face, and Hux ran, putting distance between them. He reached the door and Kylo was almost too late to lock it. Almost. The lock slid into place and Hux was trapped. Kylo gestured, and Hux came sliding back, his boots slipping against the polished durasteel floor as the Force yanked his shoulder directly into Kylo’s palm. Kylo’s red blade ignited, crackling in the near silence of the room, the only other sound the frantic panting of their breaths. No stream of consciousness emitted from Hux’s brain, even in his panic. A quick jerk, and the saber protruded from the center of Hux’s chest. Fatal, but not immediate. Not his heart, which would still beat for precious seconds more. Kylo deactivated his blade and gently lowered Hux to the floor, the call of the Force sated and sleepy.

Hux was gasping, the sound high and reedy and clotted with fluid: blood trickling from his mouth. Kylo held him close, trying not to jolt him overmuch as he worked open the clasps of his uniform. It wasn’t Hux’s fault he was designed to tempt Kylo, and Kylo would spare him whatever pain was not necessary. Hux’s hands still moved to try and thwart him even as the man died. “Stop it,” Kylo said in his ear. “You’ll make this worse.” Regret twisted at him -- still Hux’s mind and Force presence were dark and silent, guarded. His scent was dulling with the life in him, that outward expression of emotion and sexuality and habit draining away before Kylo could drink his fill.

“Stop!” Kylo groaned, echoing himself in the vision. His face had gone sickly gray as though he were the one stabbed through the middle.

“Sorry,” said Kuruk.

“There must be another path,” Kylo had realized what he might not have until it was too late without Kuruk -- he would still crave Hux after the man was gone, if he dispatched him.

“There’s always another path,” said Kuruk, putting her hands on her hips. With her slight frame, the effect was amusing. Though as deadly as the rest of the knights, she looked like a disgruntled pixie. “You must go to him, though. We cannot lose sight of our goals, and the Resistance will not wait. Watch him first, Master. It could help, to see him...differently.”

She was right, Kylo thought. “Okay,” he said heavily. “Okay.” He pulled out his Order-issue datapad and set a meeting for this evening. It was promptly accepted. That gave him time. Time to figure out what he would do.

Kuruk sat on the floor for meditation. Ushar crawled beneath the desk, glad that the excitement of this new development had deterred Tru from requesting a rematch and determined to keep things that way. She was sore from the last fight still.

Tru and Vic removed their armor, making themselves comfortable in the interim. Vic drew a hairbrush from her satchel and sat in the corner to attend to her golden hair. Tru dove into Kylo’s bed, feeling rather entitled to it, the back of her shaved head turned to the room, her dark skin barely visible in the gloom as the lights went down automatically. Kylo let her be, only sitting on the edge as he reached out into the ship at large to stalk.

He wandered, peering through the eyes of others until he saw a bright flash of red hair. Hux was sitting in the officers’ lounge with Mitaka and a large blonde woman in silver armor. It was distasteful to Kylo, the way Mitaka’s thoughts wrapped around Hux. Mitaka reported directly to him, and so he interacted with Hux the most out of any of the 55,000 souls aboard the _Finalizer_. Mitaka hung on any words of praise that fell from Hux’s lips, and was terrified of his ire. He held great respect for Hux as a commander, and a warrior. That was surprising. It was hard for Kylo to imagine Hux on a battlefield.

“Just tea today, sir?” Mitaka was asking. It was lunchtime, and Mitaka and the trooper captain -- Phasma, his mind provided -- both had bowls of some sort of stew in front of them.

“I’m not hungry,” Hux said dismissively.

“Did you eat breakfast?” Phasma asked. When he just sipped his tea silently, her voice took on an edge. “Armie, you can’t survive on caffeine and cigarra.”

_Armie?_

“I feel a bit sick today, is all.” His voice was crystal-clear, his face expressive. He did not wear his features like a mask here with these two people. His mind was quiet, unavailable.

Protective concern flared in both Phasma and Mitaka. It bothered Kylo, the possessive edge they both felt toward the General. Particularly Mitaka’s. Phasma’s concern at least, was borne of simple friendship. What did it matter if Hux’s comrades wanted to protect him? Kylo might want that too, if the desire to kill him wasn’t so great. How had such a pasty, thin man amassed such power? Even if he had momentarily broken free in Kuruk’s vision, no small feat for a victim of Kylo Ren, he was still destined to lose in the end.

Hux’s words sunk in, and sudden anxiety made Kylo’s stomach drop. _Was_ the man ill? It was hard to judge. He looked so delicate with his translucent skin and fine bones… _fine bones to pick your teeth with_ , prodded the Force. Kylo shook it off. What if Hux was sick? What if it got worse, taking him from Kylo before Kylo even decided how to navigate this? If Kylo were in the room with him he could hear the function of his lungs, his veins. Would he know if there were a tumor in Hux’s head, or would that too be shrouded? Kylo realized he was _worrying_ , just like that dimwitted Mitaka, and cursed himself.

He switched to Phasma’s thoughts, which tasted better. Phasma was preferable on all counts to the officers of the _Finalizer_. She, at least, had seen close combat. Had she any Force ability, she would make a good knight.

_So you might kill one Force null_ , Vic thought at him, studying her reflection in the mirrored back of her hairbrush. _Big deal. We’ve all done it, with and without hearing the call._

_Leave him be. We need this man so that his soldiers fight for us,_ Kuruk shushed her.

_You can resist,_ Ushar supplied from beneath the desk, her faith in Kylo evidently not shaken by the morning’s events.

_Might as well get it over with either way_ , said Vic. Tru stayed out of it, dozing off behind him.

_What do you want?_ Ushar asked, peeking her head out from behind the desk. Her face was still obscured -- she’d dragged her hair over it.

_I want…_ thought Kylo, even as he was looking at Hux’s face through Phasma’s eyes, the image printed dizzyingly over his current view of his own room, _to see him again_.

_Why?_ This was Kuruk, the ever-present visions in her head cycling as her question prompted Kylo into thought that would drive action.

_I’m curious._ It was the truth, and his curiosity decided the issue. Kylo was curious about Hux, about the secretive silence of his mind and his lack of presence in the Force. He could not allow calamity to befall the man before he got answers. Especially by his own hand. Kylo wanted to know what Hux was thinking.

“I’m ninety-three percent sure you won’t kill him if you meet with him this evening,” Kuruk said aloud. “Yes, it’s firming up. I think it really will be okay, Master.”

In the lounge, Hux had his datapad open on the table, evidently pretending to work to avoid further nagging by Phasma. Mitaka could see the screen, and was privy to the truth that Hux was only doodling aimlessly. Kylo examined the sketch, fascinated by any creation of his hidden mind, but it was meaningless. A looping pattern of lines and swirls drawn with the fine point of his stylus. Whatever he was thinking of, it was not this. Even in his concern, Mitaka did not betray Hux to Phasma. He fancied himself closer to the General for keeping his mouth shut. Trusted. Kylo grimaced. Whatever place at Hux’s side Mitaka thought he had should be Kylo’s. They were _co-commanders_ , for stars’ sake.

The day passed, Kylo watching Hux through the eyes of his subordinates. Stalking. He found himself unable to accurately predict Hux’s reactions, guessing wrong time and time again. Was he really so blind without access into the thoughts of others? Kylo had thought himself perceptive, but Hux continued to surprise him with the orders he gave and the ways he interacted with his staff. He was often careful, cautious. But he also had a temper, Kylo saw, particularly when it came to the workings of the ship. As their meeting approached, Hux detoured on his way to his office to speak with technicians hard at work on the radar array. He all but quizzed them when they snapped to attention, growing visibly frustrated with their answers and then ordering them out of his way. They scattered like mouse droids, their minds racing, and Kylo was shocked when Hux lowered his tall frame to the floor and reached into the open panel himself to wrestle with the protruding wires. The array hummed to life in half the time the technicians had predicted.

_There he goes again,_ thought surly Matt, _Bet he knows how everything works on this damn ship. And he’s sure to give us a reprimand since Daen talked back._

It was time. Kylo got up and replaced his helmet, the knights gathering round to place reassuring hands on his shoulders and wish him luck.


	2. Risk

When Kylo entered Hux’s office, the door sliding open at his approach, it was just as he’d seen in Kuruk’s vision. Sparse, for a man who lived full time on this ship. There was only the viewport out to the cold stars and Hux’s chair and desk, barren except for a cigarra tin and lighter, and his datapad. The pad’s holographic display blinked out, returning to the screen. Hux stood and came around his desk to stand in front of it, just as Kuruk had foreseen. Kylo kept his distance this time. He’d sucked in a big breath just outside the door, but he couldn’t hold it forever. It was already growing stale.

“Your helmet,” Hux said. “Can you breathe without it?”

The question seemed ludicrous for just a moment, and then Kylo realized he was being directly compared to the late Darth Vader. His heart soared.

“Yes.”

“Remove it, please.”

Kylo brought his hands up and released the clasps of his helmet. It hissed when they disengaged, and he lifted it off, holding it in front of himself. Kylo studied Hux’s face as Hux observed his, trying to gauge what the man thought of him. Hux’s expression gave little away, only twitching in the barest hint of surprise. Perhaps he was unsure before that Kylo was human. Perhaps that was important to him -- Kylo was yet to see any xenos serving in the Order, anyway. Even at this distance Kylo could sense that Hux’s pulse quickened. With what? Fear? Arousal? Hux _should_ feel fear, if he had any tendency toward self-preservation. Kylo studied his eyes, and in this light they had changed. There was depth to them that Kylo had missed before. The green was softer under the dimmed lights in this room than it had been in the hard white glow of the conference room, and there were flecks of silver and blue in them. It was less like facing the wall of a glacier and more like looking into a reflecting pool that distorted the image of a forest above. Still, he could not see through them.

Kylo knew his own face was overly expressive. It betrayed him frequently, part of the reason for the helmet. He steeled himself to take another breath, closed into this office with Hux. Kylo tried to breathe shallowly, and it was like swallowing coals. He fought to keep his own face neutral and knew he failed, because Hux’s twisted to mirror it. Displeased at Kylo’s evident displeasure. Kylo could laugh, if the situation weren’t so dire. He could almost taste Hux on his tongue. The craving was stronger than it had been in the morning, with other bodies around and with Hux having showered more recently. The hours that passed and his exertion with the radar array had made him sweat, his musk mixing enticingly with the essence that only a Force user would pick up on, different for each individual. Kylo knew from the minds of the knights that his own soul translated into the scent of dark woods and smoke. Hux smelled like strong black tea and citrus, and something hot. Maybe a spice, or maybe just ozone.

 _That one_ , the Force insisted again.

“No,” Kylo said aloud.

“Pardon?”

“Another conversation. Sorry.”

Hux was spooked now, his posture changing, reflecting caution. Not fear. Not yet. “I received orders from the Supreme Leader,” he said, electing to ignore Kylo’s outburst, “and I confess I fail to see reason in chasing shadows across the galaxy while the rebels gather their forces.”

It was Kylo’s turn to be irritated. “Skywalker is at the heart of it. Kill him and we win.”

Hux openly scoffed. “If the old heroes want to hide, let them. Forgive me, Lord Ren, but I disagree. General Organa commands the Resistance. I do not believe silencing her brother will deter her.”

Kylo felt his face twitch at the mention of his mother. “Leave her to me.”

“So I’m to leave all of it to you? How very convenient,” Hux murmured, looking at Kylo as though he thought him idiotic. Kylo almost wished for Hux’s polite mask to return. “Wars are not won alone,” Hux said, echoing Snoke. Had Snoke said the same thing to Hux, or had Hux come about it from his own experience? Snoke had talked with Hux before through the glitching light of holograms, Kylo knew. Did Snoke realize that Hux’s mind was impenetrable? Another thought, this one infuriating: had Snoke placed the blockade for him? Hux continued slowly, as though Kylo had not caught his meaning, “They are not lost alone, either, Ren. I will assist in this search for Skywalker as it has been commanded of us both, but he is not the key.”

Kylo took another shallow, searing breath. He wanted to press his face against Hux’s. He wanted to close his throat with the Force. He took the few short steps between them, crowding into Hux’s space even as he knew it was the beginning of the end. He could see the fury on his own face reflected back at him in Hux’s pupils. The caution he’d inspired in Hux shifted to alarm. Hux brought up his left arm, the one with the knife in his sleeve, it’s holster spring-loaded and ready to launch the knife into his hand with a flex of his muscle. Kylo grabbed that forearm, closing his gloved hand around the sleeve and the knife below it, stopping Hux from arming himself with it. Hux’s mouth fell open. The contact felt like an electric pulse.

“Don’t,” Kylo ground out through clenched teeth. Standing so close was not something he’d thought through. Hux’s body was warm. Kylo could feel it across the scant distance between them. He wanted to pull Hux tight against him just as Kuruk had seen. If he did, he knew Hux would struggle. They’d fight. Kylo knew the inevitable outcome. He would not let it happen. “Don’t,” he said again, making his voice lower and softer. Less threatening, he hoped.

“Stay out of my head,” Hux hissed at him, eyes bright with hatred. “You won’t use mind tricks on me, Ren. You’ll live to regret them.”

Kylo was struck dumb. Hux didn’t know. It was unlikely, then, that Snoke’s hand was in this. That was both a relief and a worry. It meant that Snoke trusted Kylo. But would he decide that a General Kylo couldn’t read was too risky? Kylo was glad he hadn’t yet called his Master, and decided to leave this detail out of his communications. _Could_ Kylo even influence Hux, if he wanted to? He sent a small suggestion -- _blink twice, now_ , putting a generous amount of Force pressure with it. More than enough. The room reverberated with the low rumble of it. Hux did not obey. Kylo knew he could use the Force on the man’s body -- he’d seen himself do it. But Hux’s mind was unreachable, it seemed.

“I won’t,” Kylo said, releasing Hux’s arm. “I give you my word. No… ‘tricks.’” No reason for Hux to know he’d just tried and failed. Then, conceding to Hux’s earlier point, “Skywalker will not prevent us from meeting the rebels’ every move.”

Hux relaxed slightly at that. Kylo tried to relax with him, taking another short breath.

“Your eyes look different,” Kylo said, not entirely meaning to voice the thought.

Hux looked at him, amusement quirking his mouth up, and Kylo felt his own face heat. “I thought you had hers,” Hux said, “At first. Yours are lighter at the edges, though.” _Hers…?_ Kylo realized he meant Leia, and blanched, his reaction confirming it. “Vader wore his helmet because he needed it to survive,” Hux continued, “you wear yours to hide the faces of your rebel parents. It’s _quaint_.”

Blood roared in Kylo’s ears. He was not alone in attempting to uncover secrets today. Hux had been observing him just as intently, and Hux was not accustomed to relying on the thoughts of others to figure out their pasts. It was evident that Hux was more of a threat than Kylo should allow him to be. Kylo should kill this man. The Force commanded it, even. But he’d be haunted by him if he did, by the memory of him, by the mystery.

“It’s not commonly known?” Hux asked, picking up on Kylo’s shock and discomfort.

“No,” Kylo said roughly, swallowing. “Even the soldiers of the Resistance think he’s dead.” _Think I’m dead. Ben Solo was me_. It felt so far-removed.

“Is he?”

Yet another response from Hux that Kylo could not have predicted. It was...merciful. “Yes. He was weak, so I killed him.”

They looked at each other for a long moment. Hux nodded. “Keep my secrets, Ren, and I’ll keep yours. Goodnight.”

It was a dismissal. Kylo held his breath until he left the room. He wished he had managed to dredge up any secrets at all to hold over Hux. Kylo should not find Hux as fascinating as he did. He wanted to root out his memories and taste them all. Kuruk would be aware that he hadn’t killed Hux after all, seeing the future shift as their meeting had occurred. He returned now to his quarters, knowing the knights would be eager to know what had transpired.

When he reentered his room, Kylo was toppled over by a moving wall of energetic knights. “Well done!” Tru crowed.

“I don’t feel it,” Kylo grunted.

“Nobody died,” said Vic. “That’s a start. Since you want him alive.”

“A start,” Kylo repeated. “I’m going to bed after I call Snoke, I’m exhausted.”

They slept in a veritable pile, and despite his fatigue Kylo was the last awake. How cosmically unlucky was a man like General Hux, to come into contact with Kylo Ren? Why did his scent have to be so perfectly attuned to Kylo’s desires, and the appetite of the Force that moved through him? Hux was so frail, too. Something marked him for disaster. For all Kylo knew, at this very moment a meteor was hurling toward Hux’s quarters that the night shift pilots would fail to account for, and it would crush him in his bed.

Once it occurred to Kylo, this possibility of other deaths being pulled into Hux’s magnetic field just like Kylo had been was impossible to ignore. What if something happened to him in the night? What if Kylo woke in the morning, every sense attuned to the quiet space where Hux should be, and the man’s body was truly not there when Kylo looked? That was unacceptable. A thrill swept through him when he realized what he was about to do.

The halls were dim and quiet just outside Hux’s room. There were no conscious thoughts in the executive wing of the ship except for Kylo’s. He listened to the interior of Hux’s room, and could detect no danger. Nothing evil in the halls either. Aside from himself. He could hear even respiration beyond the door, the thud of one heartbeat.

But hazards could be silent. There was no sign of a stray meteor, but what dangers already existed in that room? A toxic gas leak was improbable. There should be no wildlife aboard. Ridiculous. Kylo knew, he _knew_ he was being absurd. But he couldn’t stop. If he could just _see_ Hux…. Could he do it safely? Yes, he thought so. The monster was restless, but leashed. He would keep a careful distance. Hux wouldn’t even know he’d been here, he just had to be certain the man was safe. It was all rationalization, all evil. Kylo knew that. But nothing could prevent him from behaving as exactly the nightmarish creature he was.

The door slid open quietly with a thought, and Kylo entered. It shut behind him, and Kylo’s eyes adjusted quickly to the gloom. The scent of this place ripped through him like an uncontained wildfire. Kylo froze, steadying himself and breathing deeply. Hux’s fragrance was layered on every surface of this room. Kylo’s head swam from the pain of it, pain verging on pleasure, and he thought he’d faint dead away, but he fought the spinning that threatened to take him. He would have to get used to this if he was really going to attempt any kind of regular proximity to Hux. Another deep, burning breath. Another. Another. Was it getting easier, or was that madness?

Hux’s quarters were bigger than his. This ship had not been built with co-commanders in mind. Kylo walked silently on bare feet out of the entryway, past the small kitchenette and into Hux’s bedroom. The entire layout was just as sparse as his office had been, no personal effects save a tumbler of golden liquor on the counter and two glasses beside it. One in case the other broke, as the saying went. There were certainly no signs he entertained here. There were few tells that he even lived here. Disappointment welled in Kylo at that. He’d hoped to be able to glean something about the man from his possessions.

Kylo sat on the ice-blue couch in the bedroom facing the bed, and watched. His anxiety guttered out. Hux was perfectly fine. Safe. Not at ease, though. He lay in bed, his duvet on the floor and his sheets twisted around his legs. He wore black regulation sleep clothes, same as Kylo, but he was a restless sleeper and the shirt had rucked up. As Kylo observed, Hux twitched and threw an arm up over his head. Did he sense the danger near him?

Kylo was repulsed by himself then, as he watched Hux toss and turn, staring at the pale skin of his stomach and the dusting of copper hair leading down from his navel. Kylo was behaving like a sick voyeur. Not just behaving, he amended. He was one. He was worse than one. Much, much worse. He wanted not only to crawl up into the bed with Hux now and ravish him, but to silence him after.

 _Yes yes yes_ , chanted the Force.

That little line was between Hux’s eyebrows again. His lips parted. “No, Father,” he muttered.

Hux talked in his sleep. Kylo was electrified. Victory overpowered his self-disgust. He’d tried so hard to hear Hux’s thoughts and failed. Now here they were, unprotected and unconsciously spoken. Impossibly tempting.

“Scarparus is dead this time of day,” Hux murmured, and the words sounded different. Not just slurred with sleep. His _accent_ was different, some Outer Rim dialect with a thicker burr than any Imperial.

Kylo stared at his face in abject wonder and tried to think of something that would make the future bearable. He knew fully now that hurting Hux before his mind was revealed would be unbearable. And Kylo could catch every meteor that hurtled toward Hux and never make him any safer, because Kylo could not change what he was. Could not rip the voice of the Force out by the root -- did not want to at all, for what was he without it? But if Hux knew the contents of Kylo’s mind he would run screaming, like the intended victim in an over-acted horror holo-net program. It would be the right reaction for him to have. Kylo was monstrous.

“Ren?” Hux said.

Kylo stopped even breathing, staring in terror at Hux’s unopened eyes. Hux sighed and moved again, rolling away on his side. Kylo instantly missed his face. This wasn’t a bad view either, though. Kylo turned his head, tracing the outline of Hux’s backside in his sleep pants.

“Ren,” he mumbled again.

Hux was dreaming of Kylo. Did monsters ever feel quite so flustered? Kylo almost feared his chest was glowing, his heart felt so bright. Hux was dreaming of him, and it didn’t even sound like a nightmare. His voice had been softer than when he’d spoken of his father. Something flooded through Kylo then, and he was powerless to stop it, and he did not try. He drowned willingly. When he surfaced, everything had changed. The monster had crept back, not vanquished but diminished. Kylo would have to be careful. So, so careful.

But he could have this. He wanted this, in his complete selfishness, wanted to keep it forever. Of course, all his plots were moot if Hux didn’t want him around. This dream could be something neutral. Only time would bear it out, time that Kylo felt he could now give Hux. He breathed deeply, and the desire to keep this scent near him was strong. It burned, yes. It made him want to snap and cut and destroy, yes. But it was more intoxicating than the golden liquid in the decanter Kylo could still see from this angle, and he would not allow recklessness to deprive himself of it.

It would be better for Hux if he had no interest in Kylo beyond the professional. Kylo didn’t know what he would do then, against the sting of it. But he would try to leave Hux his life. Hux was vital to Kylo’s cause after all. Kylo would try.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posting 2 at once bc I don't want to leave y'all hanging without much direct Kylux interaction


	3. Closer

It had been months since Kylo smelled spruce trees. He took a deep breath now, just outside the western door to the base. Hux had smoked here earlier, but Kylo could not catch a hint of cigarra now. The trees overpowered it. Kylo had watched him through Mitaka’s eyes. Mitaka pretended to like smoking to be around Hux -- annoying, but useful -- and Kylo begrudgingly recognized the appeal. It was mesmerizing, watching smoke curl up from Hux’s lips.

Mitaka had left Hux’s side when they reached the base’s library -- rows of data cylinders charging in docks a hundred feet high, mostly unused. Collecting dust. Hux hadn’t indicated what he was doing there, and sent Mitaka on his way without him. There was no one in the library with him, and the curiosity nagged at Kylo. But he’d give it a few more minutes before wandering in after Hux. Maybe it would seem more natural that way, though Kylo knew Hux was beginning to suspect being followed intentionally from the looks he garnered when he appeared near the man.

The sun was setting for the first time since they’d arrived on base. At least Kylo thought there was only one -- he cast around for another and came up empty. They’d come here for an inspection, part of some routine that seemed useless to Kylo. Either bases would run as they should or not, and surely one so far out on the Rim was not vital? Hux abided by the Order’s schedules, including this one. He’d been put out when Kylo questioned it. Hux might go to bed soon, and then Kylo wouldn’t know what he was doing in the library. Going to bed would also be good, though. Kylo was anxious to keep watching here on base, and only this first night would tell him if there were any obstacles that he needed to surmount.

Kylo reentered the base and walked toward the library, taking the same path that Hux had earlier with Mitaka. He forced himself to walk slower than he wanted, his cloak fanning out behind him. He felt pulled to Hux, as if on a tether, and fought it to move at a reasonable, lumbering pace. He was in no rush.

The library was dark, only the faint blue charging lights on the code cylinders flashing. Hux was illuminated by the display in front of him that he’d positioned in the air above his datapad, flipping through some sort of complicated schematic and making adjustments. Kylo approached. He was unable to identify the parts Hux was looking at. Not a TIE variation, for certain.

“Do you mind?” Kylo held up his datapad. He already had a book pulled up; an excuse.

Hux glanced up at him, registering Kylo’s presence. “No.”

Kylo didn’t move to sit yet. No one else was in this block of the base, and only Mitaka knew Hux was here. Hux was not expected anywhere else until morning shift. The woods were scant yards down the corridor, outside the door Kylo had just come in, and they were deep. Easy to disappear into. Did Hux get some sort of thrill out of risking his life? Was he an adrenaline junkie?

“You should.”

Hux looked up again and held Kylo’s gaze this time, annoyed. “Then sit somewhere else. I couldn’t care less, Ren.”

“But I _can_ sit here?”

Hux sighed. “Yes.” He turned back to the glowing blue plans he was adjusting and pushed his slim reading glasses up on his nose.

Kylo took a seat on the long bench, closer to Hux than he should have. There were inches between them. Hux noticed but did not turn to look again. He only drew his shoulders up a little, hunching in. There was no hope in concentrating on his book with Hux so close, his scent enveloping Kylo. Tea, citrus. Burning alive. Hux shifted, leaning back and resting his hand next to Kylo on the bench, scrolling the image he was looking at down with his other hand — an oscillator of some sort?

It was odd how much difference being in a darkened room made when Hux was awake. Kylo’s senses still allowed him to map it out well, but the far side of it must be nearly invisible to Hux. And he needed lenses in front of his eyes to work, likely a result of too many nights like this, swiping from hologram to hologram in the dark. He was so vulnerable. It was vaguely surprising that this feeling was not contained to when Hux slept. He was just as vulnerable now, of his own volition, allowing Kylo near him while he worked in this desolate wing of an Outer Rim base. The air between Hux and Kylo felt electric, and Kylo’s hand moved without his permission, settling on the bench right beside Hux’s. Not touching. Not yet. But Hux knew it was there. His next intake of breath was sharper, and his eyes were moving more quickly over the images he looked at, paying less attention.

Just to touch his hand, to hold it in this darkness? Would that be such a mistake? No, if Kylo touched Hux’s hand he would only want more. More touch, more closeness. He could feel desire in him, trying to override control. Hux was glancing at him surreptitiously again. He had not pulled his hand away. Kylo caught his eye, and Hux’s pulse jumped. His lips parted slightly. Was Kylo only seeing what he wanted to see? He didn’t know Hux’s thoughts, but he was suddenly positive that Hux wanted Kylo to touch him. The man did have a death wish. Between his body and Kylo’s, the electricity hummed. One touch of Kylo’s skin wouldn’t hurt Hux, would it? _No, I need to be careful. Don’t get carried away_ . Despite himself, Kylo imagined stroking the back of Hux’s hand, gripping his wrist and pulling him closer, cupping his face, pulling his glasses off and folding them up, pushing him back and down and clambering on top-- _Enough_. Kylo took a deep breath to steady himself, and saw Hux flinch beside him.

Hux worked an agonizingly long time. Kylo considered leaving first, thinking perhaps Hux was waiting him out, but eventually Hux yawned and bid Kylo goodnight. As before, Kylo waited, and then followed.

He did not feel as much guilt sneaking into Hux’s room on-planet as he had on the _Finalizer_ . There were more dangers here. There could be a venomous spider. He was gratified and alarmed to find Hux’s quarters here on base no more difficult to slip inside than they’d been on the _Finalizer_ , no added security measures. Primarily, as always, he was there to burn his throat as much as possible, training himself to be next to Hux without striking. He stole one of Hux’s uniform jackets out of his laundry, conveniently a basket rather than a chute, so that when he returned to nap in his own bed during the day the time would not be wasted. He would still be accommodating himself to this.

There was no peace in Hux’s dreams, and no peace for Kylo, watching him toss restlessly. In this night-black bedroom the electricity he’d felt in the library reignited, a heavy and physical thing, a white-hot chain running between them. Hux could not be aware of Kylo’s presence, but seemed to feel him nevertheless. He woke himself once, making Kylo’s heart pound, but he only rolled over and buried his face into his pillow, seeming frustrated with himself for waking at all. It was endearing. He kicked his blanket off, as he always did at some point in the night, and he was wearing black sleeping shorts instead of full length pants. Kylo studied his white legs intensely, trying to memorize every detail of his form.

  
  


Kylo was recovering from his nightly vigil, wrapped in his own sheets. The knights had tried to wake him for training and he’d batted them away, finally dozing off again when a panicked thought just outside his door made him bolt up in bed.

_Oh stars, is he going to pass out? What do I do?!_

Kylo jumped out of bed, already walking toward the door, and connected with the mind just outside. It was Mitaka, carefully lowering Hux’s limp body to the durasteel floor. Hux slumped where he was lain, unresponsive, his eyes closed and his skin the pale chalky green of a corpse’s. Kylo forced his door open so fast it broke the mechanism. If Mitaka had done something to Hux, Kylo would annihilate him. There wouldn’t be a speck left of him to recover. Mitaka saw it in his face when he looked up at the sudden noise and crawled back against the far wall with a frightened squeal. His thoughts were suddenly so full of blind panic that they were of no use.

“What’s wrong with him?” Kylo asked urgently. “Is he hurt?” Hux still had a pulse, though it was rapid, and he was breathing shallowly. It was as though all of Kylo’s ludicrous fears came true, seeing Hux fall down lifeless just outside his door.

“I think he’s fainted,” said Mitaka. “It’s actually not the first time, it’s just never happened in front of me. Sir.”

Kylo knelt down next to Hux to speak to him. “Hux, can you hear me?”

“No,” Hux moaned. “Go away.” The sudden relief was so exquisite that Kylo laughed. Hux’s face twitched.

“He should go to the med bay,” Mitaka said. “Captain Phasma usually--”

“I’ll take him. You can go back to your post.”

“Yes, sir.” Mitaka scrambled away, eager for escape. At least _he_ had the correct response to Kylo’s face.

Thrilled and terrified by the situation that made touching Hux a necessity, Kylo lifted him up from the floor and held him. He realized then he hadn’t put on a shirt in his haste to get to Hux. There was no going back for one now. He strode forward, holding Hux to his chest.

Hux’s eyes opened, blinking at the harsh fluorescent lights above. “Put me down,” he ordered. His voice was weak, his skin still ashen.

“You can’t walk,” Kylo told him simply, no room in his voice for argument. Then, smiling, “You look bad.”

“Put me back on the floor.”

“We’re almost there.”

The nurses in the med bay jumped to attention when Kylo appeared carrying their General like dead weight. They directed Kylo to the nearest bed and he settled Hux there.

“Just lie down, sir. It’ll pass,” one of them instructed Hux, who looked as though he’d genuinely rather languish on the floor outside Kylo’s room than be here.

Another nurse took a blood sample with her little prognosis machine. “Your blood sugar’s so low!” She turned to her assistant. “Get him an IV.”

“No,” Hux groaned. The assistant paused, his eyes big, looking between the General of the First Order and the senior nurse. She smacked his shoulder and shook her head at him, the message clear: the med bay was her domain. The assistant rushed to comply.

Kylo hopped up to sit on the bed next to Hux’s, ignoring the pointed looks from the med bay staff that suggested he could move along. Hux was starting to get color back in his face, his lips turning pink again. Staring at Hux’s mouth made Kylo feel strange. He shifted where he sat and looked at Hux’s eyes instead.

“I thought Mitaka was dragging your body off to hide it.”

“Ha-ha,” said Hux, without the faintest hint of humor.

“Honest. I’ve seen corpses with better color.” Which was true, now that Kylo thought about it.

“Ren, be quiet.”

“I thought I’d have to avenge your murder.” Also true, Kylo would have.

“Poor Mitaka. I think I frightened him half to death.”

“ _You_ did?”

Hux smiled thinly, laughing low in his throat. “I imagine you scared him worse, didn’t you?”

“You bet.”

Hux shook his head and sighed. “You came running?”

“It’s not like Mitaka was going to budge you. You’ve got a foot and half on him.”

“How did you know where we were?”

“You were at my door, actually.” Before Hux could respond, Phasma appeared at the edge of the curtain and beckoned to Kylo. Hux shot her a particularly venomous look that she ignored. Kylo hopped down to follow her. She walked him out to the far wall, beyond Hux’s hearing.

“He’ll burn himself out, if he continues like he does,” Phasma confided in Kylo, her voice low. “There’s not much we can do. Push him too far and he’ll pull rank. But he can’t do that with you.” Her blue eyes shone meaningfully before she walked away.

Hux was released quickly. Kylo heard the nurses instructing him to eat more. He thanked them cordially, but said nothing else.

The hours passed, and Kylo formulated a plan. Before setting foot on the _Finalizer_ , Kylo would have scoffed at the idea of having a co-commander so predispositioned to trouble. Now, he was almost glad of Hux’s bad habits if it resulted in another way to spend time with him.

Kylo opened the door to Hux’s office. Hux looked up, sighted Kylo, and turned back to his work. Kylo sat in the chair across from him and set the bowl he was carrying down heavily, making a noise. Hux’s eyebrows drew low.

There was a faint keyboard melody playing from Hux’s datapad, and a moment later Kylo recognized it.

“Zena Eiss?”

“Yes,” said Hux, sounding surprised. “You know of her?”

“I love her stuff.”

“Hm.” Hux was at least relaxing to Kylo’s intrusion now.

“About earlier….”

Hux bristled anew. “Thank you for your concern, Ren, but it is unnecessary.”

“You skipped dinner.”

“I’m working.”

“I brought you a bowl.” Kylo pushed the serving of stir fry he’d brought a millimeter closer to Hux. “Phasma mentioned you like this. At dinner. When you weren’t there, after fainting--”

“Yes,” Hux snapped. “Okay. Thank you.” He made no move to take the bowl.

“Can I get you anything else?”

“No, Ren.” But Hux cast his eyes around the room.

“What are you looking for?”

“I left my code cylinder….”

Kylo turned and sighted it on the window’s ledge. He reached his arm out and summoned it. It whizzed through the air and slapped into his palm. Hux jumped so violently he almost fell from his seat. Kylo almost swore his hair stood on end.

“It’s more efficient. Surely you can appreciate that.” Kylo said defensively. He set the code cylinder on the desk, and Hux looked at it distrustfully as though it might bite him. “There’s your cylinder. Now,” Kylo said, jerking his chin toward the bowl next to Hux. Hux looked supremely angry, but he ate a bite of rice anyway. “You’ll have to do better than that, unless you enjoy falling on your face in front of your men.”

“Thank you, Ren,” Hux said, plastic gratitude. “I’m quite busy, shall we speak in the morning?” Lazy. Such an effort would only work with the weight of Hux’s title behind it.

“I don’t mind waiting here,” Kylo said. At Hux’s expression, he added, “For the dish.” Hux’s gaze was murderous now. “You did _pass out_ ,” Kylo reminded him sternly.

“I have too much to do--” Hux yelped as his datapad zipped out of his hand and into Kylo’s. “ _Careful with that_.”

“I’ll leave when you’ve eaten something substantial,” Kylo promised. Hux dug in to the bowl of food, chewing like he wished it was a dish of Kylo’s organs instead. It was hard not to crack a smile at the display, but Kylo managed. Hux ate half of his food and then pushed it away. That was better than nothing. Kylo handed the datapad back over. “Goodnight, General.” Kylo said, and then on his way out the door, “Try to stay upright tomorrow?”

The door closed on Hux’s cursing, and Kylo did smile then. Two troopers scrambled away in terror at the sight.

  
  


If Kylo focused on the crackling of the fire, he could almost tune out everyone else around him. He made a game of it for a while, sinking in and out of awareness of the minds that he had accompanied down to the beach.

The outing had been Phasma’s idea, and she’d managed to talk most of their visiting party and few base personnel into it. Wrestling in the sand had also been her idea, and Kylo had promptly lost a match to her, which drove off any other would-be volunteers.

Kylo sat now on a log by the pyre they’d built, watching the flames. He tuned in to the crowd again, finding Phasma’s voice automatically. She and Hux stood together a ways away from the rest of the group, white plastisteel cups of the evening’s libation in their hands. It was something fruity but strong. A few of the officers were already blasted on it.

“There’s new blood here,” Phasma told Hux.

“No,” he said, catching her meaning before Kylo did.

“You need a good lay. It’d make you less grumpy.” In Phasma’s mind, Kylo saw the last time she’d noticed Hux going off with someone at the end of a night out, more than a year ago. Kylo swallowed roughly. He left his seat by the fire, walking over to Phasma and Hux to join them in a desperate bid to stop the conversation from continuing. It worked. Phasma and Hux fell into a pained silence once Kylo stood with them.

“The evening’s nice,” Kylo said haltingly.

Phasma hummed an agreement, then muttered, “Thanisson’s become a nuisance.” The man was currently running around the pyre with total abandon, shouting half-sentences at anyone who acknowledged him. “He ought to go to bed, but he...disagreed, when I suggested it earlier.”

“I could help,” said Kylo. “Call him over.”

Phasma did, and Thanisson trotted loosely to her side, swaying. “We both think you should turn in for the night,” she told him again firmly, indicating Kylo with her hand, and Thanisson’s face screwed up in petty anger again.

Kylo raised his hand up, pointing at Thanisson’s head, and Thanisson dropped instantly into sleep. Phasma caught him, barking a laugh, her mind radiating shock. “He’ll sleep til morning, if you want to take him in,” Kylo told her.

“Thanks,” she said. “I’ll stick Mitaka with it. _Mitaka!_ ” She was already turning away, hauling Thanisson with her.

“Impressive,” Hux murmured.

Kylo’s pulse jumped. He hadn’t been trying to impress, had he? Just to be helpful. Perhaps they were the same. His skin felt warm from more than the heat of the fire. The sighs of the ocean filled the next silence between them, making it comfortable, and Kylo realized he and Hux were now alone on the outskirts of the gathering.


	4. Visions

“Walk with me,” Hux requested. Kylo sensed he could turn it down without offending him, and so he should. He didn’t want to. He fell into step with Hux, walking away down the beach, the great pyre licking up at the sky behind them.

Hux seemed to be enjoying himself. He was breathing deeply, a soft almost-smile on his face.

“You like the beach?” Kylo asked.

“It’s refreshing,” Hux said, his voice neutral.

“Do you know how to swim?” Kylo could teach him, maybe. No, better not to. The thought of all that skin on display...Kylo would take risks he shouldn’t.

“My planet was more ocean than land.” Kylo tried not to feel disappointment at that. Hux went on, “Not like this, though. There were always storms. This beach is preferable.”

“You like the difference,” Kylo mumbled.  _ Not the similarity _ .

Once the other figures on the beach were only shadows in the distance, Hux stopped abruptly and turned toward Kylo. The sea wind had ruffled his bright hair. It helped, too, with the scent. Would it be so overpowering if Kylo had the man’s thoughts to concentrate on? That wouldn’t make a difference at this distance, Kylo thought ruefully. He’d stepped forward without planning it, without meaning to, imposing himself on the space around Hux. They were barely inches apart. Hux’s back was to the sea, trapped. It had been unwise of him to let Kylo between himself and escape. And Hux stayed, like he always did. Unafraid? No, just proud. His pulse had quickened, his body reacting to the obvious threat Kylo posed even if his mind didn’t.

Kylo could stop this. Stop risking Hux, and his own command of Hux’s military, for his own selfish curiosity. He could send one of the knights to converse with Hux in his stead when required, he could keep himself away on missions. Hux would go on with his life -- he would  _ have _ his life to go on with. He’d continue on commanding the Order and sharing time with his few friends, he’d meet people and perhaps he’d follow Phasma’s direction and crawl into bed with one. Perhaps he’d marry. It was common, Kylo knew, in the Order. Advantageous. Many officers married younger than Hux was. Kylo could picture it, Hux in white dress-uniform instead of his customary black. The pain the image caused him was scalding. He begrudged Hux this future without him.

“Ren,” Hux said, drawing Kylo back to the present. “You don’t look well.”

“What?”

“Just repaying the favor, since you’ve decided to monitor my meals. When’s the last time you slept?”

“I sleep fine.”

“Your dark circles beg to differ, and word is you’ve been commandeering the C Block gym.”

_ Commandeering…? _ “I have...napped there, on occasion. I’m not kicking anyone out.” Kylo said sullenly.

Hux chuckled deep in his throat. “I think they fear waking you incidentally.”

“That’s not unwise.”

“Are your lodgings not satisfactory? I can arrange something else.”

“No. I mean, they’re fine.”  _ I hardly spend time there _ .

“The Order needs you at your finest as well. Must I start tucking you into bed?”

Kylo’s stomach flipped. “That’s not smart. You should stay away.” Hux looked at him, eyes sparkling. Teasing. Kylo shook his head desperately, staving off the desire clouding it. It did things to him, these brief moments when Hux looked at him like that. Kylo wanted to close the distance between them, which would be very...unwise, as he’d put it. Kylo was slipping, and eventually he’d make a mistake he couldn’t recover from. The evening felt colder suddenly.

  
  


“How does today look?” Kylo asked Kuruk for the second time since breakfast as they waited in the cantina lunch line. He could feel her rolling her eyes behind his back. If anything had changed, she would have alerted him.

“Clear around you, Master.”

Okay. One more day. Kylo would see Hux once more, set the story up, leave him with a good memory. This too was selfish: Kylo’s own desire to be remembered fondly. And it was treacherous. He already grasped at excuses to extend the deadline -- two days, four. Kylo dreaded returning to the knights as a whole group after this. Some days were harder than others to live with two perfectly matched couples, disgustingly in love. He had little gift for the future, but Kylo saw many hard days ahead.

They ate in relative silence. The weather had turned cloudy with a brewing storm, but rain did not yet fall, and the atmospheric pressure messed with everyone. Particularly people more accustomed to space. Hux looked as though he might draw his blaster and shoot the first unlucky soul that approached him with a problem today.

Hux excused himself from their lunch table after having only tea and a ripe purple fruit, perhaps to smoke. That’s what Mitaka thought anyway. He didn’t move to follow. His throat was rather sore from the excess of smoking he’d engaged in recently -- how did Hux do it? Wherever Hux was going, he’d do it alone. But that couldn’t be -- how would Kylo know he was safe? Kylo rose from his seat too, wordlessly walking beside Hux. He felt Kuruk’s amusement behind him. Amusement and not alarm, so this must be okay. Kylo could have this. Hux didn’t object, his face unreadable. He was acting as though Kylo wasn’t there.  _ Was _ Kylo there? Other minds faded away, and then there was only Kylo’s own thought-voice and the void beside him. Kylo was definitely there. The spike of anxiety he’d felt smoothed away.

They took a path through the trees, only a faint barren line where troopers had stamped down the natural vegetation into dirt doing their rounds. Hux did take out a cigarra and his lighter, engraved with his initials.

“A. H.?” Kylo asked, the first acknowledgement either of them made of the other as they walked. His voice was loud in the quiet of the forest. No one else was around, the base receding behind them. Days before, Kylo had considered dragging Hux out here. Now Hux led the way, walking them more than a mile out. No one would hear a struggle now. The very air seemed green, stifled by the trees. Kylo tried not to let his anxiety return, and turned his face away from Hux to breathe just in case. Kuruk hadn’t seen anything, or she’d have accompanied them.

“Hm?” Hux got his cigarra lit and puffed on it, tucking his lighter away again. He seemed in a better mood after his first drag. “I’m surprised Ren, no warning to stay away from you after you’ve tailed me out here?”

Perhaps he wasn’t in a better mood. “It would be...wiser...to keep your distance.”  _ Safer _ .

“You do recognize that you make that difficult?”

“It’s not my business if you don’t listen to me.”

Hux’s eyes flashed at him. “If I told you to return to base right now and leave me be, you would? That’s what you’ve been asking for, yes?”

Kylo’s skin prickled at the thought of turning back and leaving Hux to walk into the forest alone and untrackable. But…if Hux finally realized the danger he was in and took steps to avoid it, Kylo would honor that. “Yes.”

Hux turned and kept walking, not following through on the order in the slightest. Kylo felt anger rising, and clenched his fists to dispel it. After a moment, Kylo followed again. Hux glanced back with a smirk on his face at the sound of Kylo’s heavy tread echoing his. Kylo jogged to catch up, and swore he heard Hux chuckle at him.

“What does the ‘A’ stand for?”

“Oh,” Hux seemed disgruntled, and Kylo regretted asking. He knew anyway. “Armitage.”

He hadn’t known. He added that piece of information to the map he was making of Hux in his mind. “You don’t go by it.”

“This is the military, Ren.”

_ Phasma calls you Armie _ . “You don’t like it?”

Hux glared at him. “I told you not to--”

The vegetation heaved and moved ahead of them, a buried x-wing tearing free of the ferns, the roar of its engines suddenly drowning out all other noise. A rebel gathering intel, like as not. The x-wing tore through the canopy, exposing gray sky where before the trees had blotted it out. TIEs were on it within the same second, ready to launch at any moment from the hangar on the base’s roof.

A firefight broke out, lasers flashing red and green through the clouds. Hux ran several paces ahead and drew his blaster, aimed, then re-holstered it. The x-wing was too far to waste a shot on. It dipped and dived through the sky, trying to shake the crafts pursuing it before leaving the relative safety in the cloud cover of this atmosphere. The x-wing fired. One of the TIEs was hit, circling down in a ball of flame toward the earth. Right toward them.

Hux was staring at the hulking shape falling from the sky, about to crush him. He could not move clear in time. Kylo raised his hand, slowing the craft with a hideous screech of protesting metal, and ran into the path of the crash. He caught Hux around his waist, drawing him in tight just as he might have in the other lives branching off this one. To kill him in his office. To kiss him on the beach. They went tumbling to the ground together, Hux in Kylo’s arms. Kylo was vividly aware of how slim Hux felt. Breakable. The burning TIE crashed into the earth where they’d been only milliseconds prior, and fell apart.

“Hux?” Kylo asked, pulling back to look in his face, relieved that there was not blood pooling out onto the moss from the back of his head.

“I’m alright,” Hux said, though he looked dazed.

Relief washed over Kylo in a waveswell. He sucked in a breath and didn’t mind the accompanying burn in his throat. He welcomed it like an old friend. Hux struggled to sit up, and Kylo helped him, but did not release him. It felt good, having him tucked into his side. Safer. Better. _ Foolish, weak _ , Kylo chided himself.

“We need to get you to a medic,” Kylo said, knowing it would be a fight to get Hux into the medical ward two days in a row. Kylo, who had never been to a medic in his life except under duress. If Kuruk had come with them, she would laugh now.

“I’m fine,” Hux said more forcefully. “I am not going  _ back _ .”

“Your head--” Had he knocked it on the ground? There was no blood leaking from him, but there could be internal damage, and Kylo wouldn’t know….

“I said I am perfectly  _ fine _ , Kylo.”

Kylo’s grip tightened, unconsciously pulling Hux even closer. Hux put a hand on his chest to steady himself and avoid bumping noses. He’d never used Kylo’s first name before. Hearing it from Hux’s throat felt as though someone had thrown a warm blanket over Kylo’s head. Kylo released the breath he’d been holding and replaced it, drinking in Hux’s scent like a shot of whiskey. _ Like drinking whiskey through my nose. Like drowning in it _ . Had it ever been torture? Or only an acquired taste? Hux’s breath ghosted over Kylo’s lips and Kylo inhaled, breathing him. Hux’s hand trembled on his chest. So close.

_ Focus, Kylo. He needs to see a medic _ . “There’s a whole fleet depending on you to have your wits,” Kylo reminded him.

“Whatever, Ren. Just get off me.”

When they returned to base, Hux did allow himself to be x-rayed, after Kylo blocked his exit. The images confirmed he was fine. Kylo stood in the medical ward with him, listening to the medic raptly as she pointed to the glowing hologram she’d taken. Kylo couldn’t pull his eyes away from it, staring at the ghostly blue image of the brain he was unable to pick through. The data that labelled the edges listed Hux’s birthdate, and Kylo filed that information away. The medic noted that there were an abundance of healed contusions in the scan, an amount that surprised her, though her only clientele was soldiers. Kylo wondered silently if that was why he couldn’t hear Hux -- perhaps his brain had been altered so much that it worked differently now.

“Yes,” Hux snapped at her. “I’m aware. Thank you.”

The sun was setting by the time Hux was released, the passage of unused time something that he took evident offense to. Kylo remembered that he had decided this was the last day he would see Hux in person. Hux and Phasma and the rest would stay on this base a while longer, and Kylo and Kuruk would fly away to reconvene with the rest of the knights. Maybe he could still stay just the night, just watch in the night one more time like he had been --  _ No _ .

Kuruk appeared at his side. “Master,” she said. Helping Kylo keep his word, probably. He shouldn’t hate her for it.

“Excuse me, General,” Kylo said to Hux.

“Of course. Wait, Ren!”

Kylo paused.

“Thank you,” Hux said simply.

Kylo looked at Hux’s face once more, as if he didn’t already have it memorized, and then turned and fled.

“Is our ship ready?” He asked Kuruk as they broke out into the twilight air.

“What? No, watch.” She said urgently, pulling him to a stop by his arm.  _ He’s going to be my friend _ .

Kylo audibly gasped at what he saw in Kuruk’s mind. Her latest vision hovered, clear as the view through freshly cleaned transparisteel in her head: Kuruk smiling, dressed down in regulation training clothes and with one olive-skinned arm thrown around Hux’s waist. Hux was smiling too, a genuine smile and not a forced smirk. More of his skin than Kylo had ever seen was visible. He was in a black training tank too, his own white arm around her shoulders as they walked together within the drab gray walls of some Order property or another. He seemed to be leaning on her. This vision was rock solid, no shifting blurring its edges at all. It would happen. Only the timing wasn’t sure.

_ I’m going to love him. Someday. _

“Kuruk,” Kylo choked, “What… Does this?”

“There’s really only two ways left.” Kuruk said, but she was focusing very hard suddenly on the threadwork in Kylo’s tunic, a tactic she used occasionally when she was trying to keep something from him.

“Show me,” Kylo growled.

“No, it doesn’t matter anyway.” Kuruk said defiantly, her little face blazing up at him. “I don’t see us leaving. I don’t think you  _ can _ . Think about it. Think about leaving.” She challenged him.

Kylo tried. The thought alone was painful. His resolve had already crumbled.

_ I love him too, _ Kuruk said.  _ Or I will. Not the same, sure, but I still want it _ .

_ Love him, too? _ Kylo repeated, incredulous.

_ Don’t be blind, Master. Can’t you see where you’re headed? Where you already are? _

“Tell me what you see,” Kylo growled.

Kuruk took a deep breath and released it, bowing to his will. “Either one of you will kill the other,” she said, “Or you won’t.”

“That doesn’t really narrow things down.”

“It does! What’s not going to happen is you staying away from him. That’s a lost cause. Or him leaving you.”

Those words made Kylo’s heart sing. They made the Force rejoice from it’s buried cave, too, at the increased likelihood of Hux’s spilled blood.

“Show me.”

Kuruk did, and Kylo saw clearly the ruins of Snoke’s throne room on the  _ Supremacy _ , utter desolation. The loss of the war? Kylo saw Hux standing over him, his blaster drawn, murder on his face. The vision swirled and reconfigured, Kylo lifting Hux up by his throat and choking him in midair. Hux’s pale face going red and then purple, the capillaries bursting in his eyes and turning the sclera red, his irises vibrant against them. Again, the vision blurred and remade itself. Kylo lay on a beach not unlike the one on this planet, under a gray sky. A bright blue butterfly fluttered its wings in front of him and then took off as another man approached, his feet bare. Kylo sat up, taking in Hux’s form. He looked like hell. His hair was mussed, unstyled, and there were shadows under his eyes. He was out of uniform, wearing a loose gray sweater with a burn mark on the chest, and green trousers he’d rolled up. He leaned down to help Kylo up, snorted at the hole in Kylo’s own sweater and poked his fingers through it to brush at the skin there, and then held him close. “Took you long enough,” he said against Kylo’s ear. The visions faded. They’d all been fairly clear, equally as likely. As if they would all happen, but that was impossible.

Kylo considered what Kuruk had seen and said, mulling it all over. Did he love Hux? They didn’t even really know each other. Being relentlessly attracted to the man wasn’t being in love with him. But Kylo could see how easy it would be to love Hux, as though that path were the center of gravity and resisting it by any measure near futile. He could feel himself  _ beginning _ to fall in love, and could not deny it. Tearing out that fledgling feeling would be the hard path. Kuruk thought it an impossibility.

“So now that we’re staying,” said Kuruk, “can I talk to him?” She was anxious to form the friendship she’d envisioned, already missing this man she’d said nothing to yet.

“No. I don’t know. Wait.” Kylo grumbled.

“But we’ll stay with them, won’t we?”

Kylo frowned, then nodded. Kuruk smiled brightly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Life just ain't easy when the Force has it out for you AND you engage in self-destructive habits as a coping mechanism. Kylo's got his work cut out for him keeping Hux healthy.
> 
> I realize putting Hux in so many accident scenarios is silly but I am here to be silly on this day.


	5. Invitations

The day was rainy, which might have otherwise been cozy, but there were no comforts on this day. Kuruk had warned Kylo the evening before of what was about to transpire. They sat in the base’s cantina over breakfast. Hux had only a mug of caf in front of him. The rest of the people here were tucking in to bowls of blue porridge, except Kylo. He normally would have -- he wasn’t one to miss a meal. But his stomach was in knots.

_ You’re sure you don’t know what he’s going to say? _ Kylo prodded Kuruk again.

_ Sorry, Master. It’s unclear. _

Today, Mitaka was going to ask Hux on a date. To the dance tomorrow, specifically. His thoughts roiled with it, and Kylo was finding it extremely difficult not to toss the man through the wall. Mitaka would survive, probably. But Hux didn’t appreciate Kylo terrorizing the troops. Why did the First Order even have dances? Kylo had asked Hux about it after seeing the holographic postings on the walls and gotten an unenthusiastic answer about morale that confused him further. Hux didn’t seem fond of the prospect of a dance at all. That gave Kylo hope he would turn Mitaka down this morning.

Mitaka shifted in his seat, drawing Hux’s eye. At the very least Kylo wouldn’t have to listen to his fretting anymore once this was over with. Mitaka had been hoping that Hux would ask him. It was customary for the higher ranking officer to make the first move, but Thanisson had thrown off that expectation by asking Mitaka, putting him in a bind. He didn’t want to say yes, still hopeful that Hux might ask him (and therefore grace Mitaka with some sort of social importance that Kylo didn’t fully comprehend, because Mitaka didn’t either), but he didn’t want to turn Thanisson down and have no one to go with. Thanisson, hurt by Mitaka’s hesitation and having correctly guessed the reason, had been thinking daggers at Hux the last standard 48 hours. But Thanisson was not here at the moment. The rest of their table cleared away one by one, and Mitaka waited a while to see if Kylo would leave, but then he began to fear that Kylo would outlast Hux, who had a shift coming up. So it was time for Mitaka to make a move.

Mitaka had waited for this event on this mission in particular because he feared rejection, and was afraid to let his infatuation be known before Hux showed any interest in him. Coward, Kylo thought. He imagined the exact sound it would make should he break each of Mitaka’s bones simultaneously with the Force.

“Sir,” Mitaka said, and Hux put down his datapad, giving Mitaka his full attention. “Thanisson asked me to the dance tomorrow.”

“Oh,” said Hux, taken aback by the subject. “Lovely. Have fun.”

Kylo basked in the potent dismay rolling off of Mitaka. The Lieutenant had been hoping that Hux would show some small amount of disappointment. He scrambled for a response. Almost let it lay, then rallied himself. “The thing is, I told him I had to think about it.”

“Why?” Hux said. His tone was disapproving, but was there the faintest hint of relief? Kylo’s blood froze. He clenched his fist around the mug in his hand and heard it creak, releasing his hold just in time to avoid crushing it.

Mitaka’s gaze was on the table now instead of on Hux’s face. “I was wondering if... _ you _ ...might be planning to ask me.”

Hux hesitated.

Kylo felt suddenly that he could see the future just as Kuruk did. Hux might say yes to Mitaka’s question, or he might not. But someday he would say yes to someone. He was handsome and accomplished and intriguing, and the people that surrounded him were not oblivious to that fact. Whether Hux would settle for any of the lackluster officers Kylo had met -- maybe he  _ liked _ their dullness, he helmed the Order, after all -- or whether someday he moved on somewhere else entirely, he would eventually say yes again. He had in the past, if Phasma’s insinuations were to be believed. Kylo stewed in rage and pain, wishing he could lash out in this moment and destroy something. Anything that would stand for a proxy for the eventual someone that Hux would inevitably take on his arm. Only the fear that a tantrum would influence Hux to take Mitaka's defense stilled Kylo.

“Mitaka,” Hux said gently. “I think you should accept Thanisson’s offer.”

“Did you already ask someone?” Mitaka asked sullenly, and his eyes flitted up to Hux, and then to Kylo. Kylo realized he had betrayed his interest in the proceedings; he hadn’t looked away since Mitaka had spoken. The wild envy in Mitaka’s mind helped Kylo put a name to his own emotions. He was jealous. Not of Mitaka but of the nameless and faceless possibility of a suitor anywhere in the galaxy.

“No,” said Hux. “I’m not going at all.”

“Why not?”

“I’m going to the city tomorrow night, beyond the forest. I’m on leave.”

Mitaka’s voice turned unpleasantly wheedling, “Does it have to be then?”

“Yes,” Hux said briskly. “So you shouldn’t make Thanisson wait any longer. It’s rude.”

“Okay. Yeah. You’re right,” Mitaka mumbled, and wandered away, clearing his dishes away with him, completely demoralized.

Kylo wished he could revel in Mitaka’s disappointment, but he was too anxious himself. Suppose Hux only said that to let Mitaka down easy? This was the first Kylo had heard of any leave scheduled. What if Hux had only done that to avoid grief with Thanisson? Or what if Hux was interested in someone else entirely?

Kylo turned his eyes to Hux. Hux’s were closed, and he brought his hands up and pressed them to the sides of his face, his shoulders curled inwards defensively. Strange posture, for him. His spine was always ramrod straight, his shoulders always back. Hux shook his head slightly as if trying to push a thought from it, a thought Kylo would give a limb to see. His face was subtly flushed. He looked more human in a way Kylo seldom saw through the eyes of others. It was strange that he let his perfect image slip now. Didn’t Kylo count? Did he want to? Fascinating. Frustrating.

_ What are you thinking right now? _ Kylo almost asked it aloud. Knowing the battle was lost, and that Kylo did not have the willpower to leave Hux alone, what stopped him from pursuing him? That would-be future on the beach somewhere tugged at his heart, the familiarity with which Hux embraced him.  _ Don’t forget the Supremacy _ , Kylo warned himself. But the warning seemed distant, forgotten almost as soon as he’d thought it. Death wasn’t reason enough to resist what Kylo wanted now, to prevent their lives from colliding and demolishing each other.

Hux looked up, sensing Kylo’s gaze. His expression was guarded, suspicious. “What do you want, Ren?”

Kylo was taken aback, fearing for a moment that  _ Hux _ had picked  _ Kylo’s _ thoughts out of his head. What was it that hardened Hux’s face now? What had he done? “I don’t know what you mean,” he said.

“If you’re going to laugh get it over with.”

Oh. Hux was embarrassed by Mitaka’s attention.

“I already worked so hard not to,” Kylo said, smiling.

Hux smiled thinly too, the worst of the color starting to fade from his face now that he knew he wouldn’t be mocked. “I should go,” he said, but he didn’t move yet. He was still looking at Kylo.

“Are you really going to the city?” Kylo asked.

“I am.”

“Do you want company?”

Hux raised his eyebrows at that.

Kylo forged on, “I wanted to get off the base soon. If you’re taking a speeder out tomorrow, well, I could drive one way, if you wanted.” Alone in a speeder, moving through the forest. The base only had enclosed ones, and Kylo’s throat burned at the thought.  _ Get used to it, have to get used to it _ . The offer sounded casual and light to Kylo’s own ears, but he couldn’t hear Hux’s thoughts to know what he made of it.

Hux’s heart was beating faster, but was that good? Or was he mortified to have to hand out another rejection so soon?

“I don’t understand you, Ren,” Hux said, and his face was deliciously bare now, his confusion plain on it. “Do you want to be around me or not?”

“It would be better not to,” Kylo said honestly, “but I’m tired of trying to stay away. I...can’t.” Kylo’s pulse increased too, and he panicked. “Will you go with me tomorrow?” He demanded, the words sounding harsher than he’d intended in his fear.

Hux nodded, his heart pounding. “If we’re going to hell, we might as well do it thoroughly.” He said. An accurate summary of the situation. And yet Kylo felt he could run for miles, his body was so light.

_ Yes, he said yes to me.  _ Hux had said  _ yes _ , the sentiment that Kylo had feared being bestowed on another. He’d said it to  _ Kylo _ .

“Are we…” Hux was searching for a word. Kylo wished he could hear the alternatives the man was dismissing in his pause. “Are we going to try and be...friends?”

Kylo considered it, and spoke slowly. “That’s not enough.” He looked into Hux’s eyes and knew his own expression was searing. If Hux valued his life it would scare him away.  _ Please run and save us both. Please never leave me _ .

Hux checked his wristcomm and cursed. “I’m late,” he stood abruptly. “I’ll, um, see you? 16:00 hours tomorrow at the garage. Alright?”

“Yes,” Kylo said at once. “I’ll be there.”

  
  


Kylo watched the clock on the far wall of the garage that housed the base’s assortment of speeders. Droids moved around him, not paying him any mind. He’d stolen away to this place early, afraid of being delayed somehow when the time came. Afraid of the unconscionable loss of the time ahead should he be tardy. He stood now, watching two droids work on one of the crafts, his hands clasped behind his back. He hadn’t bothered with his helmet, and he worried his lower lip with his teeth while he waited, hardly seeing the sparks flying in front of him. His mind was elsewhere.

He’d confessed, earlier.  _ That’s not enough _ . And Hux had not turned him away after. But he hadn’t addressed it directly, either.

Attraction. Not the same thing as love, but tied up with it. Kylo had no idea whether Hux was attracted to him or not. He scoured his memories of Hux’s physical responses, but the quickening of a pulse or change in breathing could just as easily be anxiety as interest. Instinctive apprehension was the appropriate response to a Knight of Ren. Without reading Hux’s mind, Kylo couldn’t be sure. Uncertainty haunted him. What did Hux think of, when he thought of Kylo? Surely he must think of Kylo at all. So then, what?

Did he imagine Kylo’s arms wrapped around his body? Kylo pulling him close, tipping his chin up with one hand and tracing the shape of his lips with his thumb? Leaning in closer where Hux could feel Kylo’s breath on his mouth? The fantasy stopped there. Kylo shivered with it, with the idea that Hux might have pictured any part of it and been pleased. Attraction was an impossible dilemma, because Kylo was attracted to Hux in the worst way. Could he even kiss Hux without risking the man’s life? He was beginning to think so, but was it hubris?

And what did Hux expect of tonight? That thought made panic twist his gut. Kylo wasn’t wholly inexperienced -- he had the holonet to fill in the gaps, after all -- but the extent of his past trysts was only clumsy fumbling, and those partners had called him Ben. What if he couldn’t give Hux what he wanted? What if touch was too much, and it was run or kill?

_ My pursuit of him is indefensible _ . What kind of relationship could Kylo even offer a man who seemed like he was born to test him? Kylo’s face twitched, his eyes shiny, reflecting the sparks of the droids’ work. They flickered to the glowing numbers on the wall again. 15:58. Hux was never late. But suppose something was wrong...what if he’d fallen? Or there was another rebel skirmish? No, Kylo would hear it. What if he was sick -- he hadn’t eaten much at breakfast, though Kylo suspected illness was only an excuse. It was still raining steadily just like the day before, the sound of it drumming on the roof. What if Hux was struck by lightning? Or accosted by another rebel spy secreted away on this base, biding their time after the sudden flight of their ally? Kylo's jaw clenched at the thought of another  _ sentient _ hurting Hux. He’d tear apart anyone that tried, skin from muscle, muscle from bone.

15:59.  _ Where _ \--

“Oh. You’re early. What’s gotten into you?”

Kylo turned, unable to mask the immense relief on his face. He doubted himself the next moment. Hux was very nearly in disguise. He wore plainclothes, not Order regulation, and his hair wasn’t slicked back, damp from the rain outside. Should Kylo have worn something different? Something not black? Hux was wearing a blue jacket.

“You look nice,” Kylo said.

Hux stopped short, looking Kylo up and down. “It’s an improvement, you know,” he said decisively.

“What is?”

“Leaving the bucket off your head. I don’t think I’d said so before.” Hux’s eyes were glittering. He was teasing again. “This way, we’re taking the one on the far side.”

They slid into the silver speeder, Hux having commandeered the driver’s side. With the doors closed, the outside world faded away. Hux turned on the heat and held a hand in front of the vent until he was satisfied. He turned the radio down so that the tune burbling from it was the faintest of background noise. Within the confined space of the speeder, the scent of him was nearly as tempting as it was in his bedroom. He smelled better from the rain. It washed away that cologne, Kylo decided, breathing deeply and evenly. He wished again that he could see into Hux’s mind. It would offer a reprieve from his other senses.

Hux steered them out into the rain and into the forest, sticking to the winding path cleared for speeders. Kylo concentrated on not jumping him, in any sense of the word. What would he do if he weren’t a monster? They might talk.

“Do you like the rain?” Kylo asked.

Hux glanced at him. Kylo could smell rueful amusement. “Sometimes.”

“You need to give me more to work with.”

“It reminds me of home.”

“And you like that sometimes?” Kylo could empathize.

“I miss the planet, occasionally. The people less often.”

Kylo could definitely empathize. “Where?”

“Arkanis.” Outer Rim. It explained the accent Hux lapsed into in the mire of dreams. Kylo chuckled, and Hux glanced at him again sharply. “What’s funny?”

“Nothing. I’m from Chandrila.” Kylo tried to move the conversation along. Was he, though? He’d left Chandrila young.

“Core World brat,” Hux snipped. His voice was leaden with something, and Kylo ached to know what. Then he remembered that they were trying to be something now. He could ask.

“What do you mean?”

“Mm.”

Okay, maybe it wasn’t as simple as asking. “Have you got something against the Core Worlds?”

“We’ll get our due,” Hux said neutrally. “They’ll get theirs. I didn’t take leave to talk politics.”

“Okay. Where are we going?”

Hux clicked his tongue. “The seediest port-town bar I can find.”

Kylo’s pulse jumped at the idea that Hux had planned to make this trip alone. There would be plenty of sentients in a place like that looking for an excuse to cause some damage to anyone that wandered nearby, much less the leader of the First Order. “What for?”

“Use your imagination.”

“You could drink in the lounge. Or your room.”

“Yes.”

Kylo frowned. What wasn’t available at Hux’s fingertips on base that he could find elsewhere? He had authority on base. Anything was at his beck and call. Not that he took advantage of that, Kylo mused, thinking about Hux’s bare quarters on the  _ Finalizer _ .

“Lost?” Hux asked. Then added, “No cheating.”

No mind reading, he meant.  _ No worries _ . “Lost,” Kylo agreed.

“You’ll figure it out.” The lights of the port-city twinkled ahead of them, approaching rapidly. “You can pick the spot, actually,” Hux said. “Find a good one.”

“Quiet or loud?”

“Locals.”

“Got it.”

That was something Kylo was capable of. As they entered the grimy city streets and slowed to a crawl, he tuned in to the minds around their speeder, following the threads that were the most inebriated. He murmured directions, calling out turns that Hux took without complaint, until they reached a wharf. A large and dilapidated circular building was built out over the water, rain plinking loudly on its sheet-metal roof. Warm light spilled from the wide viewports on its sides, and shadows moved within. Hux parked the speeder nearby, and they jogged together through the rain.

Kylo reached the door first and held it open for Hux.

_ Oh my _ , a passing waitress’s thoughts imposed themselves on Kylo’s mind. This planet’s local inhabitants were human, and she clocked the both of them as humanoid  _ and _ new, two things that immediately generated her interest. She noticed Hux first, by virtue of his coloring, and thought he had a handsome face, but then she saw Kylo. She was thinking rather salacious things about his build, and rushed to tell a coworker about the giant that just walked in.

Hux had slowed, allowing Kylo to walk in front of him. Kylo headed for the bar first. Hux had asked for a bar. But Hux coughed behind him. Kylo turned.

“Perhaps something more private?”

Kylo blinked. Was Hux asking for privacy  _ with him _ , or was it just his nature? Kylo changed course, and Hux followed him to a booth at the back of the place. He slid into one side, and then his nerves sang when Hux slid in beside him instead of across the table.

The waitress that had noticed them walk in appeared, appraising Kylo a second time and deciding her original assessment held.  _ His face is a bit odd. Wouldn’t matter in the dark _ . “What can I get you tonight, boys?” She hit a button on the side of the table and holo-menus glitched into existence at its center, but Hux didn’t give them a glance.

“Whiskey, neat.”

“You got it, babe,” the waitress batted her eyelashes at Kylo next.  _ Are they together? Could I give him my number anyway?  _ “And you?”

Kylo looked at the hovering menu, and worried he’d forgotten how to read. His vision swam. “Uh, just the same,” he said, and then he smiled at her. He felt it must look ghoulish. It felt that way, unnatural on his face.

“Okay. Easy! Holler if you need anything. Be right back,” the waitress bustled off.

“You shouldn’t do that,” Hux admonished him softly, reaching around to deactivate the flickering menus.

“Do what?”

“You must know the effect you have on people.”

“I didn’t scare her,” Kylo said uncomprehendingly, and Hux laughed.

“You didn’t need to dazzle her. It’s hardly fair. Poor thing.”

So Hux had noticed the woman’s interest without knowing her mind. “You think I dazzle people?”

Hux scoffed, his face twisting in disgust, eyebrows low. “The amount of insipid drivel I’ve heard from my officers since you came aboard--”

Kylo interrupted him. “Do I dazzle you?” Once the words were out it was too late to recall them, but Kylo did not languish long in regret.

“Frequently,” Hux snapped, and he flushed faintly. He looked radiant. “You want me to say it out loud? There you go.”

Kylo drew in an ill-timed breath and choked on his own spit, turning away to cough into his elbow. When his airway was clear, he gazed back at Hux helplessly.  _ I dazzle him _ .

“Stop that,” Hux murmured, but he was smirking.

“What?”

“That. Stop looking at me like that.”

“I’m only looking at you,” Kylo objected. The waitress returned with their drinks, and Hux gripped his glass. His fingers looked so delicate. “Have you eaten today?”

“I’m not hungry.”

“You never eat at breakfast. You must eat occasionally, to stay alive. Or should I set up a feeding schedule?” Hux hummed noncommittally, a non-answer. Kylo pressed, “Humor me.”

“Another night. It would interfere, tonight.”

Kylo’s brows drew low. “How?”

Hux took a deep drink from his glass, emptying it halfway of the amber liquid within. “With the forgetting.”

“You came out here to forget yourself,” Kylo realized, the piece clicking into place. “Why bring me?”

“You did ask.”

“What if I want to get to know you?”

“Then time is of the essence, for you.” Hux drank again.

“If I ask you questions, will you answer?” Kylo ventured.

“Perhaps. If--”

“You can’t just give me this?”

“You know better. Don’t interrupt, it’s rude. I was saying: if you answer mine.”

“Why did you let me come with you?”

“Next.”

“That’s the easiest one I’ve got.”

“No. How does that mind reading of yours work?”

Kylo grunted angrily, incensed by Hux’s refusal to share. This game had been Kylo’s idea in the first place. But this question wasn’t so bad. “How does it ‘work?’”

“Limitations,” Hux clarified.

_ Only one _ . Hux’s skin glowed under the golden lights of the bar. His lips looked soft. Kylo wanted to see if that was true. He swallowed roughly, drinking from his own glass. The burn of the liquor hardly compared to the way he’d been spending most of his nights, breathing straight fire.

Hux reached over suddenly, and took hold of the hand Kylo had left fisted on the table. He brushed his fingertips lightly across the back of it, just as Kylo had wanted to do to Hux their first night on this planet. Hux didn’t have to agonize over the decision, he just did it. His touch was warm and gentle. It had been so long since Kylo had known a touch like that. The only hands to touch him in friendship for years were the knights’, and their touch was boisterous. Hux slid his little finger against Kylo’s, and Kylo hooked his around it, stunned that he was being allowed this.

“I worry about you,” He blurted suddenly.

“You haven’t answered the question.”

“Hux, please. I will… I’ve been worried that something will happen to you.”

“We  _ are _ at war.”

“I mean, like… lightning.” It sounded insane. It had been bad inside his head, and it was worse out loud, but Hux didn’t scorn him for it.

“Maybe you interfered with fate,” Hux chuckled. “When you stopped the TIE. It’s possible it will only happen another way, soon, if you believe in such things. I would have died then.”

Kylo stilled, the ugly truth of it hitting him. “Not then,” he said. “You were supposed to die the first time we met.”

Hux’s pulse jumped. Kylo knew that if he met Hux’s eyes he would finally see the fear that should have been there, as Hux realized how long he’d been in the vicinity of the death fate had arranged for him. He waited for Hux to yank his hand away. Hux did not. Kylo chanced a look at his face, and found him unreadable. Calm. He leaned in just a bit and inhaled. The only negative emotion coming off of Hux was an old sadness that no longer had any bite.

Hux spoke at last. “Now answer.”

Kylo reeled. “Uh. It’s like people are talking to me, sort of. I can listen closer or tune them out. Listening over distance is harder. I can’t do it through calls. People don’t know I’m hearing them unless they’re attuned to the Force. Memories are harder, if they aren’t being recalled in the moment. Digging them up can hurt. You’d know.”

“Hm,” Hux said, processing that. “What was the waitress thinking?”

“It’s lewd.”

Hux moved his hand, but not away. He pushed it further under Kylo’s. “You must get a lot of that. I’m rather glad I can’t hear my officers.”

“Yeah,” Kylo said, thinking of Mitaka. “It’s common.” He lighted on an idea, and leaned in to peer around Hux and speak low into his ear. “Over there, the man at the end of the bar?”

“Mm-hm.”

“Sex,” Kylo went down the length of the bar. “Sex, sex, credits, sex...lost a bet yesterday, sex.”

Hux laughed and then snorted, and that made Kylo laugh. Then Hux was leaning into him, laying his head on Kylo’s shoulder. He was so close. Kylo turned his face in toward Hux’s bright hair, dry now from their time indoors, and breathed there. He burned. Penance, he thought. The Force thrust Kylo at Hux, and he’d been a most unwilling executioner, and now there must be a sacrifice. A burnt offering. Let Kylo burn, if it meant Hux was alive with him. Kylo extracted his hand from Hux’s and put the arm around him, using it to hold him close. Hux sighed, moving his hand to Kylo’s thigh beneath the table.

He turned his face up slowly, and Kylo held his ground, not moving away. They looked at each other, and Kylo was unable to decipher the look in Hux’s eyes. Was Hux having more luck with his? He was perceptive in the way Kylo had given himself credit for before Hux turned everything on its head. Hux’s liquored breath ghosted over Kylo’s lips.

“What am I thinking, right now?” Hux asked, his voice low. That other accent was creeping in, driving out the Imperial notes.

Oh no. Hux couldn’t know. Kylo could not allow that vulnerability in himself. Could he? Kylo wanted badly to trust Hux and give himself over. But... _ Who are you? _ Kylo thought. The man nestled against his side from shoulder to boot was not the General from the day before. He could not be mistaken for him. Even Phasma, if she walked into this bar just now, would look past this Hux at first. Kylo was sure of it.

“Well?” Hux’s eyes flashed. His body against Kylo’s was not as relaxed as his sprawl implied. He wasn’t drunk, Kylo realized. No, of course not. He’d only had one drink.

Kylo panicked. He didn’t know what to say, what to do. What was Hux playing at? Kylo kissed him.

Flames licked up Kylo’s face and guttered down his throat. His hands itched to constrict around Hux’s neck, to end the pain the Force had saddled him with on this contact. He moved them there and then held them still, trembling against Hux’s skin, feeling the pulse beneath it. The racing pulse. He would not stop it.

Kylo had dreamed of crushing Hux to him and taking what he wanted, but it was Hux that moved first, responding to the contact that Kylo had clumsily initiated. Hux’s hands were buried in his hair, holding him close and adjusting the tilt of his head, and then Hux’s tongue was in his mouth. Hux licked into him, setting his every nerve to thrumming, and then pulled back to bite his lower lip. He tugged at it until Kylo moaned, and then rejoined the kiss. Kylo moved with him, not breaking apart until his lungs screamed for air.

“Stars, Kylo,” Hux panted against his mouth.

“Yeah,” said Kylo.

Then Hux was taking one of Kylo’s hands away from his throat — Kylo felt guilty for having put them there, for having  _ wanted _ to do something so — Kylo gasped. Hux had gently placed Kylo’s palm against the front of his trousers, and Kylo could feel the hard length there, hot against his hand through the fabric covering it.

Kylo whimpered. The sound was pathetic to his own ears. Beneath his palm, Hux throbbed.

“Do you want to,” Kylo started to ask between the little kisses Hux continued to give him, “um, the speeder…”

“If you mean to go back, yes. I’m old.”

“Thirty-four isn’t old,” Kylo said. Was Hux calling this off? But then why hold Kylo’s hand there? Hux jerked his hips up, grinding against Kylo’s palm where he held it, and Kylo’s hand shook.

“Too old to bother with the back of a speeder.”

_ Oh _ . Kriff. “You want to go to bed with me?” Kylo asked.

“In every sense of the phrase. Actually,” Hux pulled back just a bit to look Kylo in the face. “You share your room, don’t you? So I want you to come to bed with me, Ren.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Twilight "Do I dazzle you?" exchange is so kylux to me I couldn't not use it, 'dazzle' is 100% a word in Hux's vocabulary and Kylo would 100% come right out with the question upon hearing it.


	6. Collision

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Contains smut.

They’d walked as though nothing had changed, careful space between them, across the base from the garage to Hux’s quarters, though few were awake to see them. The moment Hux’s door closed, the scent of his quarters hitting Kylo full-force, Hux was on him again. Hux backed Kylo into the wall, kissing him deeply, tugging at his clothes. Hux’s nimble fingers made quick work of the buttons in Kylo’s tunic, and then he spread it open, his hands roaming Kylo’s chest.

“This is not fair,” Hux said, squeezing Kylo’s left pectoral muscle. Kylo gasped at the feeling of Hux’s palm dragging over his nipple. “You decreased the efficiency of the medical ward by at least ten percent, sitting there with your shirt off like a holo-net romance cover. You’re a _distraction_.” His voice contained a more personal edge on the last word.

“The feeling’s mutual,” Kylo muttered. Had he thought of anything else since meeting Hux? Hardly. He pulled his tunic from his shoulders and let it drop, kissing Hux back feverishly, tasting him. Kylo pushed off the wall, unwilling to let Hux have the upper hand here. Anywhere. He walked Hux back toward the bedroom, pulling his blue jacket open and off and going for the shirt beneath. In his eagerness he tore it.

“Beast,” Hux murmured against his mouth, and then bit him.

“Ow,” Kylo grunted, tearing Hux’s shirt the rest of the way open as revenge.

They stumbled into the bedroom, Hux down to his regulation black underwear, his hands pulling Kylo’s leggings down. Kylo could feel himself stiffening, his cock growing thick with blood. Hux’s tented out the front of his boxers enticingly. Kylo kicked off his leggings and pulled Hux in, eager to reestablish the contact they’d lost. Hux’s skin was hot and smooth against his. He muttered something too low to catch when he felt Kylo’s erection pressing against his stomach. Kylo’s hands explored the planes of Hux’s body. He was thrilled to be able to do this so easily. Burning, burning, but it could be done. He could stand here with Hux nude in his arms, weak points on display, _kissing him_ , and not slaughter him. Kylo pressed his nose lightly against the soft skin right beneath Hux’s ear, and Hux laughed breathlessly.

“Your nose is cold.”

“Warm me up.”

Hux took Kylo’s hands and directed them to his underwear before clasping his own on Kylo’s face, pulling him into another round of breathless kisses. Kylo pushed the cloth down and out of his way, shifting slightly with Hux as he stepped out of it, and then brushed his hands back and over Hux’s ass, feeling the pert muscle there. In the next second Hux was climbing him, his hands on Kylo’s shoulders, evidently sure Kylo would support his weight. Kylo held him, hands clasped on his thighs, face tilted up now. Hux withdrew his tongue from Kylo’s mouth and Kylo chased it, making a noise low in his throat at the sensation layered atop physical feeling. It was like licking a live wire. Hux slid his tongue against Kylo's, and Kylo tasted ozone.

Kylo had deposited Hux on his bed beneath him before he knew what he was doing, breaking their kiss to mouth at his throat, feeling the racing beat of his heart in the blood thrumming beneath the surface there. Hux gasped. They moved together, limbs tangled. Kylo took the skin of Hux’s neck between his teeth, careful not to break it, and Hux moaned.

But there were no thoughts. No images, no wants coiling hot in his mind. Did Hux like it, what Kylo was doing? Was he only being polite? Ben Solo had experienced that once, and it cut him to the core. Why had Hux agreed to this? And what the hell should Kylo do next? The unknown ripped at him until his eyes were wet with anxiety.

Hux shifted -- Kylo had stopped. Stopped grinding against his thigh, stopped kissing his neck. Stopped breathing. Kylo took a fresh breath, trying to shake off the crippling uncertainty, and then saw the dazed look on Hux’s face, and sobbed.

Hux looked at him in shock. “Oh, hells,” he muttered, and then pulled Kylo against him, one hand rubbing warm circles over his shaking back. They lay without speaking, Kylo’s face on Hux’s flat chest, for so long that Kylo calmed, his body no longer wracked by tears. He started to drift down into mortified sleep, until Hux’s voice pulled him back, his chest purring with it beneath Kylo’s ear.

“Kylo, how old are you?”

“Twenty-nine.”

“You don’t seem twenty-nine.”

Kylo didn’t ask for clarification, the meaning immediately clear, though Hux had tried to put it delicately. Shame and rage made his face and ears hot. He was glad for the darkness of the room. “I’m not a child,” he snarled. “And I’ve done...things.”

“You never answered my last question, at the bar,” Hux murmured in the quiet dark, ignoring Kylo’s outburst.

Kylo stiffened, fully awake now, and feeling another bout of tears threaten to fall. What would he do this time? Hux’s thoughts were as unreachable as ever. “I got distracted.”

“I get another one, then. For free,” said Hux.

“Okay.”

“What have you been doing at night?”

Shit. “What do you do at night?” Kylo bit back.

“Sleep, usually,” said Hux. “Which you spend half the day at. So what have you been up to? Since it’s not sex.”

Kylo sniffed.

“That was uncalled for,” Hux said at once, sour shame rolling off of him. “I don’t mean to pressure you. This is also nice. I mean that.”

Hux was walking back his words, as if Hux had wronged Kylo with a simple jab. It was Kylo who was wrong, intrinsically wrong. He shivered pleasantly at the idea that Hux thought this was nice, laying tangled together like this. But it wasn’t what Hux had wanted, that was obvious. Kylo was too tired and broken-hearted to lie.

“I’ve been watching you sleep.”

“Come off it.”

“Hux.”

“The door locks.”

“Hux.”

Hux moved then, toppling Kylo off of him and staring down at him, his green eyes wide with affronted horror. “You’ve been _watching me sleep?_ ”

“I like it,” Kylo said defensively.

“You just...watch?”

Kylo nodded.

“Show me.”

“What?”

“Show me,” Hux said again, shoving at Kylo’s chest.

Kylo scrambled out of bed. The air chilled his skin and his nipples pebbled up. It was his turn to feel shame, made to reenact this sin for the one he committed it against. Hux, though, had transitioned into intrigue. That was strange, but Kylo knew the terror would follow.

Kylo walked around the bed to his habitual chair and carefully lowered himself into it without a sound, placing his arms on the armrests. He knew he looked every bit a nightmare sitting like this in the dark, his body pale and his hair and eyes black. Like a wraith in the corner, staring at Hux.

“Huh,” said Hux, his pulse hammering.

“I wear clothes,” Kylo muttered.

“But otherwise, it’s like this?”

“No,” Kylo said, and then seeing Hux’s questioning gaze, “you don’t look like that. During.”

Hux gave a small huff, but laid down again.

“The sheets come down. You move a lot.”

Hux tugged the sheet down below his hips. Kylo swallowed audibly as Hux’s cock came back into view, soft now after the disaster of their attempted coupling.

“I wear clothes too,” Hux said. “Usually.”

“Yes. But your shirt comes up most nights.”

Hux stretched like a felinx, and Kylo’s breath caught again as he watched the shadows of the room play across Hux’s skin. It was a motion meant to inspire lust, unlike his sleeping twitches. Kylo wondered dimly if Hux knew the performance wasn’t necessary. That Kylo wanted desperately to crawl into bed next to him when he was rumpled and drooling.

“You talk in your sleep.”

Hux froze, his face going cold. He radiated something bitter that Kylo couldn’t discern, a poignant mix of emotions. “Nothing new to you, I suppose,” Hux ground out, and Kylo could tell it was a comfort. Guilt wrenched at him, and the confession caught in his throat, choking him.

“You say my name,” he said instead.

“Do I?” Hux looked unsurprised, and Kylo couldn’t help but lean forward. “What do you do, when you hear it?”

“This,” said Kylo. “I just...the same.”

“You don’t touch yourself?”

“No.” _I want to touch you_.

“Is that not what this is?”

“It’s...more than that.”

“Are you satisfied by it?”

_Never, I want everything_. “No.”

“Then, tonight…” Hux said haltingly, “...you can have more.”

Kylo released a shaky breath. Audible, he knew Hux heard it. “It’s not the same.”

“I know. You could put me out, if that’s easier for you.”

Another wave of shock stole over him. Did Hux have no sense of self-preservation at all? To allow the monster in front of him to render him unconscious, to _offer_ it… It didn’t matter. Kylo was certain it wouldn’t work. “No,” he said quickly.

“I could pretend?”

Kylo licked his lips. He felt his cock twitch in interest, and Hux’s eyes flitted down to it and back up. He lay back again without another word, and closed his eyes. Everything about him betrayed his waking state; he didn’t twitch, he didn’t turn, and his heartbeat raced. But the lighting in the room was the same, the timing of this, his pale face and tousled red hair robbed of its brightness in the dark. Kylo stood on joints he couldn’t feel, and approached the bed. His own breathing came in panicked bursts, and he fought to calm it. Hux didn’t stir as Kylo stood over him, though his mouth twitched.

Kylo put one hand down on the bed, feeling the texture of the sheets with the lightest touch, imagining that he hadn’t accompanied Hux to the city and only now returned to his side, unknown, wondering where Hux had been and what he’d done, and unable to see it in his dreams. He ghosted his other hand over Hux’s navel, running his fingertips over the hair just below it. An indulgence. Then Kylo steadied himself and crawled up onto the bed, supporting himself over Hux on one hand and his knees. The mattress dipped and creaked, something that should have woken Hux. Hux didn’t move. Kylo sat back, not dropping his weight on Hux, but he wanted the use of both hands.

Fingers traced over Hux’s brows, down his sideburns and jaw. Kylo’s digits were cold with nerves, and he could almost believe they weren’t his at all, except that he could feel Hux’s flesh under them. Kylo breathed in an unstable gasp, as though he were being pulled underwater and didn’t know how long it would be before he surfaced. Hux’s eyes darted beneath the thin white barrier of his eyelids, but he didn’t open them, perhaps guessing correctly that the action would break this spell.

Kylo moved his hands down, stroking them along Hux’s throat, feeling him swallow beneath his grip. He could break his neck now, with just a quick jerk. Over in a second, hardly any pain. Merciful, in honor of whatever it was that hung between them now. Kylo had taken many lives in worse ways, for reasons much smaller than the demand of the Force itself. _But reasons known_ . Even if it were only to slake Kylo’s own rage in battle, he’d understood the price of each of his murders. The full toll of this one eluded him, slipping by in silence like a hunting loth cat darting through bustling market shadows, and he wanted badly to lay all of Hux’s mysteries bare before he could decide whether to appease the Force in this or not. He _wanted_ , but was it enough? His hands tightened, and Hux’s next swallow was rougher under the pressure, his full lips coming open. Still he did not move. His eyes did not spring open in panic. It was madness, Hux trusting him with this. Or was it? Even if Kylo ever did crack Hux’s mind open and everything was made clear, could he stand to give this up? To lose it? Kylo took another sobbing breath.

Hux’s skin was hot, night stealing the color from the flush Kylo knew was spreading on his face and down his chest. Kylo was fully hard, and he took one of his hands away, trailing it down Hux’s stomach, intending to give himself relief with a few quick pulls. That would be enough, with Hux laid out under him like this. The heel of his palm met the head of Hux’s cock before he lifted it from his skin, and both of them gasped at that. Hux had hardened too, his cock curving up over his white belly and leaking. A string of precome came away on Kylo’s hand and cooled quickly.

Hux was beginning to sweat in want of stimulation. His scent was intensifying, burning Kylo inside his own skin. Kylo’s grip closed on Hux’s neck without him telling it to, pushing Hux down into the mattress. Hux choked, his hands coming up instinctively to wrestle with Kylo’s, and then he stopped and _put them back down_ , palms up and open on the bed. His spine had curved up, though, his hips lifting as Kylo put pressure on his neck, and they met Kylo’s now, erections pressing together inadvertently. Kylo wrapped his hand around both and tugged, twisting on his way up. Hux moaned.

“ _Fuck_ ,” Kylo hissed. The only sounds in the room were their panting breaths, and the slide of Kylo’s hand on both their cocks. Kylo lowered his own body, widening his knees to make the positioning more comfortable for Hux, letting him lower his hips to the bed again. Kylo’s movements were inelegant, the pumping of his fist disjointed and unpracticed in this, but they were both so close that it didn't matter. Kylo pressed his thumb against the slit of Hux’s cock on his next stroke up, and by the time his hand reached the base again Hux was pulsing.

Hux fought his body. His ribs rose and fell as he breathed deeply through his nose, and his muscles shivered with the obvious intent to carry his orgasm out in a show of shaky gasps, perhaps curses. Instead he lay mostly still, his hips jerking once. He bit his bottom lip and grunted quietly, the only noise he made as he spilled over himself.

Kylo pumped them both again, drawing a choked noise from Hux at the drag of his hand over sensitized flesh. Kylo’s hand was wet and sticky with the semen that had still been dripping from Hux, smearing it over himself. Kylo came too, the hot rush of it making him cry out. There was a tremendous clatter of noise that he didn’t comprehend, working his hand over himself and shuddering until he’d wrung himself out onto Hux’s stomach as well. Hux’s navel was full of milky white seed. Kylo wanted to dip his tongue in and lap it out. His head cleared.

The contents of Hux’s closet had exploded out of it, the sliding door bent outward and dented in a shining and complex pattern of swirling diamonds. The refresher lights were blinking erratically, and Kylo could see that the mirror had cracked in a whorling pattern too. The desk and the chair were situated upside-down on the ceiling. Kylo carefully set them back where they belonged. Then he turned and looked the other way. The window’s glass had blown out, littering the floor beneath it. A cool breeze came in. The rain had stopped outside, but the air still smelled of it. The main lighting had shattered just as completely as the window, missing the bed as though there had been a shield generator just below it. 

“Fuck,” Kylo said again, and then because that wasn’t adequate, he dropped his lips to Hux’s chest and mouthed over his racing heart, licking the salt of his sweat from him.

Finishing was the sign that Hux had evidently been waiting for from Kylo. His eyes opened and he was shaking, breathing in great gasps through his mouth. His first breath out turned into a groan. Kylo felt the vibration of it under his palm, and removed it from Hux’s throat as though he’d been burnt.

“I’m disgusting,” Hux said, and Kylo searched for the words to reassure him that Kylo was worse, before he realized Hux meant the white fluid going tacky on his skin.

“I’ll get a towel,” he said, and got up on legs he wasn’t sure would carry him. They did, but just barely. He cleared the glass on the floor with a thought, sending every tiny shard into a pile in the corner.

Hux sat up at the strange chime-like noise, taking in the damage. “You’ve wrecked the place,” he said, his voice still distant and dreamy from his orgasm. “We’ve got to work on that.”

Kylo wandered to the fresher, swaying like Thanisson had at the fire on the beach. He knocked his hip on the edge of the now floor-bound desk on his way there and cursed. He thought he heard Hux laugh, which dulled the sting of the forming bruise.


	7. Confessions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also contains smut. TW vague one-sentence mention of Hux's mother being taken advantage of by Brendol in the past.

Returning to the  _ Finalizer _ made Hux’s step lighter. Walking onto the ship behind him, Kylo watched Hux run his gloved fingertips along the wall with evident fondness, and wondered how he could have ever thought this place was ordinary.

Kuruk was done waiting for Kylo’s permission to initiate her relationship with Hux, nearly bouncing on her heels with excitement every time she was in Hux’s vicinity. She broke her silence with him while he stood on the bridge. Hux never held a conversation for longer than two minutes on the  _ Finalizer _ ’s bridge, but he stood with Kuruk in a quiet but animated state until his shift changed. The officers working at their control panels noticed and stewed in extreme discomfort. Kylo had taken a seat around the corner to clean the panels of his saber -- how had he gotten so much sand in the damn thing? It was  _ one _ wrestling bout -- but he watched Hux’s face through Kuruk’s eyes.

Hux had been a sniper in his first assignment. This common thread unraveled into many, and soon Kylo couldn’t keep up with the words tumbling from Kuruk’s mouth, technical terms and rifle models. Hux was enraptured, nodding fervently at whatever she’d just said. They continued prattling to each other on their way to the cantina for lunch, Kylo trailing behind, content in Hux’s contentment even as he itched to have the man to himself.

Phasma joined them at their table, as she usually did, and shot Kylo a look when Hux and Kuruk didn’t even stop talking to each other to greet her.  _ That’s not like him, what -- oh, Coriolis effect. He does love that _ .

Kylo mentally nudged Kuruk to move on when she was done eating.  _ You can’t jump all the way there in one day _ . Kuruk thought an image of a rather rude gesture at him, but excused herself to go and meditate with Ushar. Phasma leapt up from the table next, giving Hux a very loose salute with one silver-encased hand, her helmet tucked beneath her other arm.

“She’s waiting to ambush you in the lounge tonight over drinks,” Kylo told Hux conspiratorially, once Phasma had left the room. “She wants to know if we’re secretly dating.”

Hux groaned, pulling his collar up reflexively as if it would ward off the unwanted conversation to come. Kylo couldn’t help smirking at him, at this nervous tic. He was so human.  _ So _ human, beneath the facade of the General. Seeing the hints that slipped through felt like a privilege, one that Kylo would jealously guard.

Kylo wet his lips and then pressed the issue, eager to know for himself. “What will you tell her?”

Hux’s eyes tightened. “A little help? This is your fault.”

“Say yes. If you don’t mind.” Kylo was unable to draw his eyes away from the flush spreading high on Hux’s cheekbones.

“I don’t mind.”

“She also wants to know how you feel about me.”

The subtle glow in Hux’s face dampened, and he grimaced. “Of course she does.”

“I’ll be listening in. I want to hear that answer for myself,” Kylo said, smiling at the face Hux made. He got up and turned quickly, before Hux could ask him more questions. He did want to hear Hux’s thoughts later, not his own.

As Kylo paced away he was aware of the speculative thoughts swirling around him, eyes flicking back and forth between the shock on Hux’s face and Kylo’s retreating form. He paid them no attention. He wanted to go to the gym and practice his forms, leaping from the rafters. Flying. Part of him was flying already, he felt.

By the time the day turned to evening and Phasma and Hux settled in together in the officers’ lounge, Kylo had almost lost himself in training and missed the start of their conversation. Almost. He let himself drop to the floor and jogged to the wall, leaning against it and closing his eyes to sink entirely behind Phasma’s, breathing hard as he recovered from his exertion.

“Tell me  _ everything _ ,” Phasma demanded as Hux was still hanging his coat on the back of his chair. She’d picked the table in the corner: increased likelihood of getting the juicy details out of Hux if they weren’t surrounded by his other subordinates. She’d already ordered them drinks, and slid his glass of wine over to him now, her hand gripping the top of it.

“About what?” Hux said reluctantly. Kylo wondered if it was because he knew Kylo was listening in.

“When we were back on base,” Phasma began, a gleam in her eye, “I  _ did _ notice that after your day off--”

Hux rolled his eyes.

“--when you had returned, Lord Ren was still missing. I happened to stop by his quarters to see if he wanted a rematch, is all,” Phasma said innocently. Her intentions had been far from innocent: she’d heard that Hux and Kylo went off on Hux’s leave together, and had hoped very much to catch Kylo absent from his own room. “I know how men hate to lose to a woman, so I like to give them the chance to do it again. But to my surprise, he wasn’t there. And Kuruk said she didn’t expect him back all night. In fact, Armie, she said he’s  _ never _ there at night.”

“Phas, please….”

“You’ve been holding out on me. What’s he like?”

“He’s a fucking maniac,” Hux grumbled.

In the gym, Kylo laughed out loud. Two troopers running through boxing drills in the corner cast wary eyes at him.

“He’s rather attractive in a gloomy way, if you’re into that sort of thing,” said Phasma, thinking rather loudly that Hux was. “So he’s been warming your bed?”

“Haunting it,” Hux sniffed, taking a deep drink of the red wine in his glass.

“Is he any good?” Phasma’s eyes were glued to Hux’s face, taking in every microexpression, and Kylo resolved to give her that rematch she’d wanted as thanks. He desperately wanted to know the answer to this question.

Hux’s mouth quirked up, he paused, and then he smiled wide. “I thought I was going to die.”

Phasma laughed, “That big?”

“That’s...not exactly what I meant. There’s more to him than that.”

“But he is, just to make that clear?” Hux looked aside demurely and swirled his wine in his glass. Phasma put her pointer fingers out, comically on either side of the table, and started moving them in. “Wink when I’m there.”

“Phasma.”

“Okay okay, he’s more than the body of a pit warrior. Got it. Do you like him? Not the sex, I mean  _ him _ .”

“Yes,” Hux said immediately. “He’s a terror, but...yes.”

“How  _ much _ do you like him?”

The gym could have gone up in flames and Kylo wouldn’t have noticed.

Hux was chewing the inside of his cheek, looking down into his glass as if it held the answer. “Too much,” he said. “More than he likes me.”

_ What? I’m in love with you _ .

“Armie! You’ve gone soft. Never thought I’d see the day.”

“You and me both.” Hux’s face was wistful.

“Do you think you’ll be, like, an item? Publicly?”

Kylo sat up straighter. He hadn’t even considered the option.

“No,” said Hux. “Better not to. It’s complicated.”

“That’s too bad. How was the date itself?”

“The waitress threw herself at him and he all but ignored her.”

“Only into men?”

“I haven’t asked. She must have been more his age too. Late twenties. Am I too old?”

“Just in your brain.”

“Too thin?”

“We all have our flaws.” Phasma was smiling. There was no cruelty in her, and Hux didn’t seem upset, but Kylo wanted abruptly to rush to his side and ensure that Hux knew he was perfect.

“Your lovers haven’t picked through your head,” Hux looked dejected, his shoulders slumping in. He picked at his collar again, trying to pull it up higher. “It makes me so nervous. I threw up this morning after breakfast.”

Phasma’s eyes were soft, sympathetic. “You only had caf.”

“Unpleasant.”

“Acidic,” Phasma agreed. “Have you talked to him about it?”

“No, I...what if I bring it up and he realizes I’m right?”

In the gym, Kylo was spinning. In the depths of his own anxiety around Hux he had yet to consider Hux’s own, beyond the self-sustaining fear he seemed to lack. Hux, faced with a monster, was anxious about impressing it. And he was vomiting? He was already so frail. Kylo couldn’t let this go further. The longer the lie spun out between them the harder it would be to tear it apart and start over. Kylo’s stomach flipped at the prospect. But if it would make Hux more comfortable around him…. Yes, Kylo needed to come clean. Sooner rather than later.

  
  


The hall that led to this viewport was quiet in the night hours. Kylo sat on the bench, waiting. Hux appeared, earlier than he had when Kylo waited for him in the garage. Perhaps testing just how early Kylo did show up when they planned to meet somewhere. Perhaps just as eager to see Kylo.

“Romantic,” Hux said, his voice warm. It was a joke -- this viewport was just like any other on the  _ Finalizer _ , a bench within an alcove, space stretching out beyond the viewport. Kylo held up a bottle. He’d procured two bottles of blue milk at the cantina, a last-minute offering. It seemed stupid now. He had felt that he needed something to make up for this somehow, and he hadn’t been able to think of anything else.

Hux sat next to him and took the bottle wordlessly, not opening it. He wasn’t wearing his gloves. Kylo wished he’d removed his own beforehand too, but hesitated to do it now. He could feel tension coming off Hux.

“Did you want to watch the stars with me?” Getting right to it, then. Hux knew there was something more going on. He always seemed to see right through Kylo.

“Yes.” Kylo said, because while it hadn’t been his intention, now that they were here he found that he wanted very much to watch the galaxy go by with Hux next to him. “And no.”

“You were listening earlier.” Not a question.

Kylo answered it anyway, “Yes.”

“You didn’t like what you heard?” Hux ventured, biting his lip after, not looking at Kylo. Nervous right now, Kylo realized, and that was the push he needed to dive in.

“I’ve not been honest with you.”

“You’ll have to be more specific, Ren.”

“I did not disillusion you when you thought I was reading your mind.” Kylo said. He took a deep breath and released it. “The truth is that I can’t hear you. And I’ve been trying.”

Hux looked at him. “What? At all?”

“Nothing.”

Hux’s face was blank, wondering. It clouded quickly. “You  _ asshole _ . Then everything you did know--?”

“From others. It was a pain. I spend every waking moment wondering what you’re thinking,” Kylo ground out between his teeth, and then felt lighter having released that truth. “What you’re really thinking.”

“You think I lie to you?” Hux asked, always ready to tip things over into an argument. Kylo couldn’t even blame him for always suspecting the worst. Kylo was worse than anything Hux could conceive of, the cold Dark whirling inside his heart, blackening it like the earth of a frozen gravesite.

“I think you...edit,” Kylo said.

Hux considered that. “Not as much as I should.”

“Enough to drive me insane.”

“You don’t want to hear it,” Hux dismissed him.

“That’s absurd.” A more untrue statement had never been uttered in all the galaxy. Kylo was getting angry, unable to keep his face from showing it. He glowered at Hux, and a lesser man would flee. Hux looked bored.

“There’s nothing in my past worth digging for, I promise you.” How could Hux not see that he was the most interesting thing Kylo had ever encountered? Hux landed on the same sentiment at the same time, but twisted it. He laughed bitterly. “So that’s it, then. If you could ‘hear’ me you’d have left me well enough alone. I wouldn’t be half so intriguing to you if I was laid bare.”

Kylo, who had seen Hux’s body laid bare and not quenched his thirst for it at all, disagreed that the man’s mind would be any different. “Try me.”

“Okay. Give me a mystery.”

Kylo swallowed, feeling that there was a banquet at his fingertips, and he was starving, but a selection must be made. A choice which might negate other options. “The contusions,” he decided. “In your x-rays, the ones the medic pointed out.”

Hux raised an eyebrow, as though this were a question he hadn’t anticipated. “Caught your eye, did they?”

“I couldn’t take my eyes away,” Kylo breathed. “I thought I’d never get a look inside your skull.”

Hux chuckled, his dark humor beginning to dissipate under the effect of Kylo’s earnestness. He was shaking his head slightly, smiling. “Alright. The contusions. Do you have any theories about them?”

“You’re a gravity well for near-death experiences. You pull them into your orbit.”

“Hm. You said that before. You aren’t wrong. I got them from my father. Punishment for having grown in the belly of the scullery maid he was using as a toy, I expect.”

Kylo’s breath hitched, sudden fury heating his blood.

“He’s dead,” Hux said, reading the shock and anger on Kylo’s face, “by my hand. Left his mark, though, didn’t he? I don’t remember getting all of them. Some, but.... I blacked out sometimes, from the beatings.” Hux was twisting the cap on his bottle of blue milk off and on, not lifting it to drink. If Hux had always been as thin and paper-white as he was now, it was a wonder his father hadn’t killed him in his youth.

“Other people don’t live like this,” Kylo told him incredulously. “You know that, right?”

Hux’s smile was wry. “Bad luck I suppose.”

Kylo reached an arm around him to pull him in, and Hux got up, leaving the bottle of blue milk on the bench and approaching the viewport to look out on the twinkling points of light floating by. His hands were clenched at his sides, pinpricks of pain beginning there as he dug his nails into his palms.

“Hux...I--”

“I thought you saw it all and wanted me anyway,” Hux said quietly.

Kylo stood, following him, his hands hovering over Hux’s hips, afraid to touch yet. “I do want you.”

“Would you still?” Hux twisted to look at him, his eyes gone flat and mean. No matter the answer Kylo gave, he would not be able to prove it.

“Do you want me?” Kylo turned the argument on him.

“Of course I--”

Kylo did grab him then, turning him around forcibly and backing him into the transparisteel of the viewport, pressing up against Hux chest to thigh and holding his hands above his head, interlocking their fingers. Hux’s hands looked even more delicate while enfolded in Kylo’s black gloves. The little crescent-moon injuries on Hux’s palms stung at the contact of the rough leather, then dulled.

“I never know what you’re  _ thinking _ ,” Kylo growled. “I don’t know if… do you understand how maddening it is to have you in my arms and not  _ know _ \--” 

“ _ Yes! _ ” Hux cried. “I do.”

Kylo remembered Hux’s conversation with Phasma, and spat, “Do you really think you care for me more than I do for you?”

“Especially now.”

They stood, glaring at each other, Kylo pinning Hux against the stars.

“You’re wrong,” said Kylo.

“You’re infuriating,” Hux bit back.

“Have you met you?”.

“I’m  _ glad _ you can’t see my thoughts.”

“I bet you are.”

“You’d clutter them worse.”

Kylo lunged, clicking teeth with Hux and pushing his head back into the viewport as he trapped him in a savage kiss. The zipper on the front of Hux’s trousers unzipped seemingly of its own accord and the button popped open. Unseen hands pulled the fly open, letting Hux’s cock spring out. Already hard. Kylo’s grip was still on Hux’s wrists.

“Ah! Ren--” Whatever Hux was going to say was lost when Kylo dropped to his knees and took the flushed head of his cock into his mouth, lost in a needy moan. “ _ Fuck _ , Kylo.”

Outside the arched doorways of the viewport, someone stopped cold in their tracks and then ran away, boots scuffing the floor. Thanisson, Kylo knew. This was one of his usual spots to smoke in, but he wouldn’t attempt it again. He was feeling rather green at the moment at what he’d just heard. Kylo resolved to have Hux out here again, perhaps to try one of the many ideas that currently tormented Thanisson.

Hux’s fingers twitched and he started to lower his hands. They slammed back into place, the invisible grip that had undressed him switching places with Kylo’s hands. “ _ Kylo _ ,” he said again, and this time his voice was thick with pleasure as Kylo swallowed him down hungrily, moving forward until his nose met Hux’s copper pubic hair. Less of a feat than if his nose were a more average size, Kylo conceded to himself. No need for undue pride. His throat worked with the laugh that bubbled up, turning out as more of a hum, and Hux cried out helplessly, twitching his hips forward to fuck himself into Kylo’s mouth. Kylo took pity on him, pulling back far enough to suck and working the base with a hand. He ripped his glove off and discarded it, wanting Hux’s skin on his wherever possible.

“Kylo, let me go. My hands,” Kylo held him fast until Hux whimpered. “Please.” His hands were freed. Kylo was astonished when Hux buried only one in his hair. He brought the other down to the level of his own face, and pulled his sleeve down with his teeth before biting down on his own arm.

Was it foolish for Kylo to imagine, as he worked Hux’s release out of him under the silver light of ancient space, the same light that had once graced their parents and grandparents on the unfortunate paths of their lives, that he was sucking out even the tiniest bit of poison that Hux had swallowed down years before? Whatever it was that made him doubt Kylo would stay should he see everything.

“You’re salty, like the sea,” Kylo said after Hux was done trembling in his grasp, biting his pale wrist between his glove and sleeve until it bruised in his efforts to dampen the sounds Kylo drew from him. Even in the throes of this, it was so like Hux to avoid indenting his glove with his teeth.

“You’ll be the death of me,” Hux gasped, not moving from where he’d sunk down to the floor against the viewport, except to redress himself. Kylo didn’t refute it.

“I’d drink you all down if I could do it and keep you,” Kylo told him. “I’d crack your head open and pull you out in handfuls.”

Hux’s voice was rough, ruined. “I think you already have. Kriffing hells, I haven’t done that since the Academy.”

Kylo was rankled, upset. He knew there were others in Hux’s past, but to hear of it was just as painful as imagining someone else in Hux’s future. “Done what?”

“Shouted in a hallway.”

Kylo’s laugh was disbelieving. How was it, exactly, that Hux’s mind worked? If he was given entrance now and could see the workings of it, would he understand, or would it seem another language? “You weren’t shouting. Let me see your wrist.”  The teeth marks were deep and red, but there was no blood flowing. Kylo ran his bare fingertips over them, and Hux winced when he pressed down.

“That’s cold,” Hux complained, jerking his hand away. Kylo held him in place.

“The Dark Side of the Force lends itself to...unnatural abilities. Hold still, I’m almost done. Okay, now the other one….” When Kylo did release Hux, the bruising on his wrist had faded, along with the indents of his own nails in his palms. His skin was smooth and white, unblemished, the ache of damaged tissues soothed away.


	8. Inevitable

Weeks passed in a haze, pleasant in privacy. Tension mounted between them in public. They trawled the galaxy in the day, keeping to their schedules. Hux manned the bridge or walked the halls, Kuruk beside him more often now, speaking with him in hushed tones, pulling memories from him that Kylo was elated to have, though she did so for herself and not for his benefit. Kylo was loath to leave the ship, even knowing Kuruk would defend Hux with her life. Whenever some lead or another toward Skywalker pulled Kylo away he chased it with fervor -- the sooner he dug it up the sooner he could return. He and Hux did have their arguments. Big ones occasionally, shouting at each other on the bridge. Hurling insults. Kylo saw in the thoughts of others that Hux’s want for secrecy was futile -- no one fought like General Hux and Kylo Ren unless it was personal, and the crew knew it.

Their nights they spent tangled together so thoroughly that Hux’s body felt like an extension of his own, both in their more passionate endeavors (slowly requiring less maintenance tickets) and in sleep. Hux twitched less in his sleep with Kylo there, and Kylo hoped dearly that he was a comfort to Hux. He could not reach into Hux’s mind and reconfigure anything that upset him in his dreams, but at least his physical presence seemed to help. Laying beside Hux at night almost made up for his animosity when Kylo disagreed with him on the bridge.

Kylo woke alone today, Hux’s bed gone cool around him without Hux in it. Kylo blinked and stretched. It was unlike Hux to let him sleep in so late. A side effect of working tirelessly was that Hux begrudged everyone else their extra rest. Kylo groped for the alarm clock on the nightstand and turned it to look at the time -- the lights in the room were still dialed down. It was only 4:00 hours. Hux wouldn’t be expected on the bridge for another hour at least.

Kylo sat up, the remnants of sleep chased from his body by the chill of fear. He was already cycling through the many minds of the  _ Finalizer _ , searching, pulling at the threads in the web they made to try and locate Hux. He bolted up out of bed as he did so, wandering around and picking up his clothes. He’d discarded them across the room the night before, when his biggest concern had been getting Hux on top of him as quickly as possible. It was a rare treat when Hux wanted to top, and Kylo had been in a frenzy since Hux had whispered the suggestion of it in his ear hours ago when they passed in the halls. After Kylo had discovered that Hux was capable of fucking him like a man with twice the reedy muscle mass he possessed, domineering and relentless, he wanted it as often as he could get it. More often.

It was why he’d slept through Hux’s departure this morning. He was still pleasantly sore and drowsy, fucked out. Kylo cursed himself as he hopped into his boots and darted out into the hallway, sliding around a corner in his blind haste. There was no hint of Hux in the cantina, the lounge, on the bridge...conference room E was empty, C held a meeting of technicians and for an instant a flash of red hair made Kylo’s heart soar, but then he realized it was far too long, pulled up into a bun. It belonged to a tech in a grimy yellow jumpsuit. In a blind panic now, Kylo searched for Phasma’s mind, finding her blessedly awake, and dove in.

“Mounting a full assault on their base would leave them scrambling. Only one unit of men can board the station, it’s tiny. I’ll go myself, with Phasma and six troopers of her choosing.”

The sound of Hux’s voice finally soothed the terror twisting Kylo’s stomach. He turned on his heel and jogged toward the little room where Phasma stood, realizing it was Hux’s private office. Why hadn’t he checked there earlier? He felt his eyes widen when the meaning of Hux’s words hit him. Hux was planning to board a rebel station? Intel must have come in; it explained the unscheduled meeting.

Kylo burst into the room, wrenching the door open with the Force. It squealed in complaint, and all eyes turned to him. “Me too,” he said.

“Ren,” Hux’s face went red at Kylo’s unexpected intrusion into both the room and the conversation. “You haven’t been briefed--”

“I’m here now,” Kylo snarled at him.  _ Why didn’t you wake me? _

There were two officers in the room that Kylo didn’t know, night-shift workers looking at him in alarm and astonishment. They hadn’t seen him unmasked yet, and were basking in a mystery solved. One of them was planning on cashing in on a bet she’d just won -- Kylo Ren wasn’t a kriffing  _ droid _ , she’d known he couldn’t be. The other was still thinking of the upcoming mission.

Kylo pointed at the officer, and looked at Hux, “Okay. Little station orbiting Teth, might know where the main base is. Let’s go.”

“I need someone on the ship to--”

“You have Mitaka.”

“It’s imprudent to have both commanders in one place.”

“We’re in one place every--”  _ Night _ . “-- day. I’m going.”

Hux scowled at him, but relented. “Fifteen minutes. Phasma?”

“Yes, sir.” She said, turning to leave, her mind buzzing now with the profiles of her troopers, selecting the six Hux had asked for.

Hux swept out of the room, and Kylo started to follow him before Hux glared. “Are you going like that?” He asked.

Kylo had left his saber and helmet in Hux’s room. He turned and ran to retrieve them, feeling the surprise and alarm of the officers and troopers he passed. Still, Kylo made it to the little chamber in the loading bay where the troopers were suiting up before Hux did. He was irritated. Was there any need for Hux to be so brisk with him? The morning had barely started. What was all that about?

Hux swept into the loading bay as the troopers were ducking into the shuttle, in just his usual uniform and coat. He had his blaster holstered on his thigh.

“You aren’t wearing armor?” Kylo asked, his irritation growing.  _ It’s as though he WANTS to die _ .

“None of it fits me.”

“You’re the General. You haven’t had any made for you?”

“It slows me down. Cuts my range of motion,” Hux snipped, starting to shove past him. Kylo could see it now, what Hux meant -- he likely wouldn’t have the range to use any of his knives in close combat if he strapped himself into bulky armor. And he hadn’t needed any such thing in his sniper days, so far removed from the bloodbath. But they were headed into a blaster fight in the cramped quarters of a space station now, for stars’ sakes. The idea of Hux depending on a vibroblade in his boot made Kylo’s skin cold.

Kylo grabbed his arm, holding him fast, and asked quietly, “Can we talk?”

“We have nothing to talk about.”

“Attacking a station by yourself? Why’d you slip out this morning?”

“I am not by myself,” Hux hissed, which was true enough. Phasma was capable. As if he read that thought on Kylo’s face, Hux’s went red. “You’ve forgotten, Ren, that I made my first kill before you could read. You aren’t my keeper.” He tried to pull away and Kylo held him fast.

“You’re wearing a blast vest.” Hux opened his mouth to protest, and Kylo insisted, “Just a blast vest. Just that.” Quieter, “ _ For me _ .”

Hux grumbled, but strapped one on over his uniform before shouldering his coat again and boarding the shuttle. The flight to the station was short, the  _ Finalizer _ having switched course at Hux’s command long ago.

The station was locked down when their shuttle docked, having sighted the star destroyer hovering nearby. They expected an attack. It would not save them. Lasers flew after Kylo tugged the locked door into the station open with the Force, saving them the time a hacker would have taken. The rebels were trapped and undisciplined, and Phasma’s troopers tore into them, forcing them back.

Kylo admitted to himself, though he never would to Hux, that he could now see why Hux had wanted to wear nothing that would inhibit his movement. He carried his knife in one hand and his blaster in the other, and in the confined space of the station his knife saw more action. He cut through the rebels in front of him with merciless efficiency, tearing their throats open with a flick of his wrist. His blaster was trained on further ground, taking shots at orange jumpsuits as they entered from the halls beyond, dropping them.

One of the rebels in the crowd panicked and turned to run, the sight of the First Order’s General in the middle of a melee having affected him equally -- if differently -- than Kylo. The split-second change in this man’s plan turned the wheels of the cosmos in another direction. He opened a door, slamming his fist down on the button and rolling under the rising metal in an attempt to escape. At the same instant, a massive blue Chiss woman was running by on the other side, the door now open, and she could see her comrades being executed with brutal efficiency. It had the opposite effect on her: she charged into battle, screaming.

She raised her blaster, her sudden appearance not yet accounted for by the troopers or their captain, and shot. The bright red bolt fizzled through the air and buried itself directly in Hux’s chest, knocking him to the floor, flat on his back. Phasma turned to engage the Chiss in combat and was swept brutally aside, the other woman slamming her blaster into Phasma’s helmet. She continued on her path, gunning straight for Hux.

Kylo spun his saber out of the rebel he’d just buried it in, letting their corpse drop to the floor, and rushed for the center of the room where Hux lay flat on his back, his blaster knocked from his hand.

The Chiss reached him first. She saw Kylo coming and pointed her blaster at him. Kylo slowed, bringing his saber up to swipe aside a plasma bolt. The woman looked at him, hatred in her blank red eyes.

“ _ Get away from him _ ,” Kylo raged at her.

She stared defiantly at Kylo Ren, and then raised one booted foot and brought it down hard on Hux’s left leg below the knee. The sudden snap of it seemed to echo in Kylo’s ears, making bile rise in his throat. Hux screamed.

Kylo charged, sweeping his saber expertly to deflect the plasma bolts the Chiss launched at him, and cut her down, cleaving her in half.

Kylo pulled Hux into his lap even as the battle raged around them, Phasma barking orders at her troopers. “Hux!” Kylo turned his face toward him. White. Bloodless. But he had screamed, and even as Kylo knew that sound would haunt him, it meant Hux was alive. Or had been, mere seconds ago. “ _ Hux! _ ”

Hux’s eyes fluttered open and he coughed wretchedly. “I’m fine.” He was not fine. Pain coursed through his body. Phasma was turning the tide against the rebels, backing them down a hallway now. Kylo tore his helmet off, shifting Hux in his grip. Hux cried out.

“Fine?” Kylo accused him, angry. At Hux, at himself.

“My ribs are broken, I can feel it. And the...um, the leg.”

“Fine?” Kylo said again, his voice building into a roar. “You’re fucking fine?”  _ You could be dead. You could be dead twice over, if she’d just taken the next shot, if she hadn’t seen me... _ .

“Ren, I’ll live.” Hux’s voice was tired, patronizing, as though Kylo were the unreasonable one. Still, Hux was right in his prognosis, and those words comforted Kylo. He shuddered, the mingling relief in his body and the sharp displeasure of the Force making him feel as though he still might retch. Relief won out. He pressed a kiss to Hux’s temple, a tear sliding down his face at the thought of how quickly Hux might have been torn from him.

There was movement to the side, a person brave enough to leave their hiding place now that the sounds of war had detoured away from them. Kylo’s gaze moved up, ready to yank any threat up into the air and glue them to the ceiling, and met the bewildered eyes of Poe Dameron. They looked at each other, Poe with a shiny coordinate cube clasped in his hand and Kylo with the wounded General of the First Order cradled in his arms. Poe held his blaster ready in his other hand, but he did not aim it at Kylo Ren, who wore the face of Ben Solo. If Kylo moved to obtain that cube, would Poe fire? He could hit Hux. Kylo did not move. Poe stepped through a port into a waiting escape pod, and was gone. There was a low rumble as it launched, their mission lost along with it.

Hux didn’t seem to have noticed. His eyes were closed, his respiration shallow, cold sweat standing out on his forehead.  _ He’ll live _ .


	9. Empire Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter!

Hux kicked Kylo out of his quarters more often than he did Kuruk as he recovered, which, if Kylo was honest with himself, was never. Kylo’s banishment was equal parts practical and punishment. He had an inkling that Hux was more irritated by Kylo having been right in any way than he was by his own incapacitation. He’d even refused to let Kylo attempt to heal him. Kuruk, in contrast, was free to lounge on the blue couch in Hux’s bedroom as long as she pleased. Hux even let her play lady-in-waiting by fetching him things, something that earned Kylo a glare for attempting. At least Kylo could watch him through her eyes when he was sent off to deal with the bureaucratic nightmare that was the First Order -- an arrangement which Hux only bowed to under direct orders from Snoke. He’d work on his deathbed if not prevented from it, Kylo knew. He still worked in bed, when Kuruk let him, on those glowing blue plans he’d been fine-tuning. Kylo was drowning in unnecessary paperwork, at his wits end. How did Hux keep everything straight? Half of the requests that were now forwarded to Kylo’s datapad made him want to crush it in his hand. Why was there documentation for  _ laundry? _

Kuruk’s vision of Hux as her close friend had come fully to fruition, including the exact scene she’d shown Kylo. He’d watched as Kuruk helped Hux hobble around the gym in their training gear, supporting him as he walked with a slim metal cast around his lower leg. They were at ease with each other, already flush with secret confidences and shared looks, and Kylo couldn’t hate her for it, because Hux was happy, and because Kylo got to see Hux’s face differently. Softer even than the expression he wore when he looked at Phasma. At times it seemed they’d been friends for years instead of weeks. Of course they had, in Kuruk’s mind. Kylo sometimes thought venomously that if Kuruk climbed into Hux’s bed with him the way the knights were accustomed to, Hux would allow it. She did not, no doubt having foreseen the fight Kylo would pick with her if she dared.

It was the end of shift, and Kylo immediately silenced his datapad. Hux kept his notifications on always, but Kylo couldn’t rise to that challenge. He wouldn’t tolerate anything coming between him and the precious seconds he could steal at Hux’s side. They always passed too quickly, a direct result of Kylo’s terrible awareness that their time was finite. Kylo wanted to forget this last battle with the rebel outpost, writing it off as one bad episode instead of the foreshadowing of their natural conclusion. The only possible end between himself and Hux was loss. Time passed and Hux healed, wincing less when he twisted around, no longer pressing a hand to his ribs with pain on his face, walking without his black cane now. It lay propped against the couch. Kylo never wanted to see him use it again.

“There you are,” Hux said as Kylo entered the bedroom, and the tone of his voice made Kylo’s breath hitch. It had been so close to a memory of the future that now seemed out of reach.  _ Took you long enough _ . Would that still come to pass? Kylo hadn’t worked up the courage to ask Kuruk, and she didn’t offer. She’d been busy of late. Hux complained of that next, though his tone was still fond. “Kuruk has hardly let me be today. You’re certain you can’t dissuade her?”

“No,” said Kylo, who hadn’t tried in the least. He wanted this memory for himself, too. He tossed his datapad on the bed. Hux was seated on the very edge, his good leg stretched out with his foot solidly on the floor, as if even laying down fully now would be a surrender. Kylo took his shoulders in his hands, resting his mouth against Hux’s forehead and inhaling through his nose.

“Brute. She’ll demand you leave, when she gets back. She wants a big reveal.”

“Then she’ll get it,” Kylo said, dipping down now for a proper kiss. “I don’t stand a chance when she’s like this.” He’d already seen it in Kuruk’s head, but he wouldn’t spoil the pageantry for her. She’d appointed herself in charge of Hux’s makeover.

Hux gave him a look of irritated disbelief, morphing quickly into familiar wickedness that made Kylo’s cock pulse. Hux tugged at his cowl, pulling Kylo in for another kiss so suddenly that Kylo might have toppled over onto him if he hadn’t caught himself.

“Careful,” he chided Hux when they broke for air.

“I want you,” Hux said crossly, his breath hot against Kylo’s lips.

“You have me.”

“You know what I mean.”

“You’re not well enough. I could have sped it up if you--”

“We’ll try different positions. I’ll ride you. You won’t hurt my ribs that way.”

Another pulse of interest between Kylo’s thighs. “What about your leg?”

“On my knees, facing away from you. Easy on the leg.”

Stars, Kylo could imagine. “You’ve been thinking about this.”

“So much,” Hux admitted, giving Kylo’s clothes another impatient tug.

Then Kuruk was waltzing in the door, two garment bags in her arms. She fussed at Kylo to go get changed himself, ushering him out the door and floating his forgotten datapad out after him.

Kylo was grateful she hadn’t gone wild with her specifications for his party attire -- it was black, and cut similar to his usual robes. The fabric was finer. He was dressed before Hux. That was no surprise, he could see Kuruk still fussing over him in her mind. He waited outside the door, chuckling at the flashes of Hux’s disgruntled face he got when Kuruk wasn’t purposely focusing on threadwork or clasps to keep him out.

Finally the door slid open. Hux was wearing deep blue; Kuruk had recognized Kylo’s preference for it when he told her of his outing with Hux so long ago. The top was cut much like his regular uniform, but it stopped at the belt. Hux’s trousers had been tailored to fit him much more closely than his uniform did, and they were made of some soft-looking material. Kylo immediately wanted to spin Hux around to look at his backside, and then shot Kuruk an annoyed look. She was smiling wide, barely avoiding laughing aloud.

_ Catch that in a vision too? _

_ No, with my regular eyes. _ She told him.  _ Every time he’s walked in front of you _ . Kuruk had outfitted herself in a draped black dress that was sheer on the sides, and her lack of armor made her look even more like a little sprite. None of the officers around her would fear her tonight, unless they caught a glimpse of the steel behind her eyes.

The officers’ lounge of the  _ Finalizer _ had been transformed, the furnishings stowed away and twinkling lights hung from every fixture left. The bar was busier than Kylo had ever seen it, an extra droid activated to fill orders. In the hangar below, the troopers were having their own party. Phasma was here for now, in a sweeping silver dress that disguised none of her muscle definition and stiletto heels that made her a full six inches taller. Her blonde curls brushed the ceiling. Her mind was preoccupied with the soonest acceptable time she could leave for the trooper celebration below. She’d mostly been waiting for Hux. On his arrival, her face lit up.

Kylo gave them the appearance of privacy at least, leaving Hux to the conversation, but he still listened to her thoughts. She was glad to see Hux without his cane tonight too. Her deep guilt at having failed to stop his assailant had smoothed over any resentment Kylo held toward her. Her feelings mirrored his own. Music was bubbling over the speakers, and some of the officers had taken to the center of the room to show off the dances they’d learned long ago. Hux was not among them, and Kylo knew from Phasma that he would not be even if he had no healing injuries. In the scant memories she dredged up of Hux actually attending celebratory functions, he hung in the periphery.

The music changed, slowing.  _ Master _ , Kuruk thought pointedly.

_ It doesn’t count as seeing the future if you must goad me into it _ .

_ Agree to disagree _ , Kuruk quipped, and then spun out gracefully onto the dance floor with Ushar. The rest of the knights had arrived shortly after Kylo. First Order personnel gave them a wider berth than they had Kuruk alone.

Kylo walked through the crowd, most of them stumbling out of his way once they registered him, until he stood just behind Hux’s shoulder. Phasma’s mind hummed knowingly and she smiled once she guessed what was about to happen, and she bid Hux goodbye with a wink.

“May I have this dance?” Kylo asked, and Hux turned, startled.

“Absolutely not.”

Kuruk had told Kylo that would be the first response. “Why not?”

Hux sighed deeply, as though Kylo were being incredibly obtuse, and his cheeks tinged pink. “I don’t dance.”

“Don’t?” Kylo asked, taking Hux’s arm -- the one that still housed his favorite knife, so that Hux couldn’t get any dramatic ideas about escape -- and tugged him forward. “Or can’t?” Hux turned his face away, but let himself be led between dancing couples. “You’re awful at it, aren’t you?” Kylo pushed. “I wish I could see you thinking about it.”

“I’m very glad you can’t. Ren, I  _ have _ broken my leg….” Hux complained, though he’d just been insisting he was healed in an effort to get more than Kylo’s fingers into him later, and put his hands on Kylo’s shoulders. He looked like a man facing execution.

“I won’t let you embarrass yourself,” Kylo said quietly. “I’ve got you.” He gripped Hux’s waist solidly, and the line between Hux’s eyebrows disappeared. Kylo didn’t try to keep up with the knights, who were making a production of twirling around the officers. He just held Hux close and whirled in a loose waltz, hardly caring if they were in time with the music. Hux’s eyes held the reflections of the glittering lights in the room, looking like a forest strung with lanterns on Life Day. Kylo knew his eyes captured the lights as well. He wondered if Hux was thinking about that, if he liked it. There was no way to know save asking, and Kylo didn’t.

The music shifted again, but it was an even slower tune, like a dream. Kylo wondered briefly if Kuruk had foreseen or engineered that, and then everything else faded away. There were only the two of them in the whole galaxy.

“How’s the leg?”

“I’m fine.” A refrain Kylo was growing very tired of hearing. That edge was in Hux’s voice, the one that meant he would  _ be _ fine even if he wasn’t. But Kylo couldn’t sense any pain from him. It was probably the truth, tonight.

“You’ll tell me, if you want to stop.” Kylo offered anyway.

“Okay,” Hux said. “This isn’t as bad as I thought.” He drew in closer and pressed his cheek against Kylo’s briefly as they swayed. The sound of his heartbeat was the only sound that mattered. It had almost been silenced forever. Kylo would never let him be caught without a blast vest. He’d hold Hux down and strap one on him himself if it came to that. Kylo found himself moving in time with Hux’s pulse. “You and Kuruk were in this together,” Hux accused softly. “Care to explain why?”

“You said it’s not bad,” Kylo said carefully. “Just...adding to that balance. The not-bad times. I don’t know. Pretend I didn’t ruin your life for an hour or two.”

Hux laughed. “I’d never be here tonight without you. Pretending you weren’t with me would involve a choice bottle and a holo-doc I’ve already seen.”

“Will you tell me something?”

“Depends on what it is.”

“You like having secrets too much,” Kylo teased. “You have to answer me right now, and be honest.”

“Fine,” Hux said, though his face promised he’d go back on it if he wished.

“What is it that you’ve been working on?”

It seemed like an easy question, almost playful. Hux was proud of his work, and few people around him had the clearance for Hux to discuss his personal projects with. Kylo had expected him to laugh and launch eagerly into it, but again he’d expected wrong. Hux hesitated, more serious than Kylo had seen him since they’d bickered over the assignment of troops to a relic recovery mission.

“I don’t want to tell you.”

“Hux--?”

“You asked for honesty.”

“You promised.”

“Don’t be a fool,” but Hux was frowning. Guilty, which was unusual for him. There was room here to prod at him.

“Why don’t you want to tell me?”

“It will scare you off.” Hux’s face was set, completely certain of it. Kylo stilled.

“You’re going somewhere?”  _ Somewhere I can’t follow _ . But that wasn’t right; the pieces Hux had been fine-tuning these last months didn’t look like they belonged on a ship, and there was nowhere in space that Kylo wouldn’t venture for him. Kylo tried to think of things about Hux that could possibly scare him, and came up blank. The concept was ridiculous; Kylo was the monster. His worries circulated around Hux’s wellbeing.

“No, Ren. Leave it be for tonight, okay?”

But that old curiosity flared, and Kylo couldn’t bear to leave it, even as anxiety radiated off Hux. “Snoke knows, doesn’t he? I could ask him.” It was wrong to threaten, Kylo knew by the sudden ice in Hux’s stare. Kylo amended quickly. “I won’t. But he’ll tell me eventually, won’t he? If you don’t, I’ll still know. I’d rather know from you.”  _ Especially if you feel this strongly about it _ .

Hux sighed, admitting defeat. “It’s a weapon. My own design.”

Kylo was silent, giving Hux the option to leave the answer at that or not, though his mind furiously ran through the schematics he’d seen, trying to piece them together. He turned his face in toward Hux’s, kissing his cheek. Hux didn’t even flinch at the public display, his eyes elsewhere.

“I’m not scared yet. You’ll have to try harder.” Kylo rumbled, circling his thumbs on the fabric of Hux’s clothes, feeling the heat of his body through the material.

Hux tipped his head to murmur into the shell of Kylo’s ear. “It will be five times more powerful than the Death Star.” Though they still stood on rigid durasteel, Kylo felt as though the floor had dropped away. There was a block of ice in his stomach that suddenly threatened to freeze him solid. “You think yourself despicable because you have the power to destroy people, Ren?” There was bitterness in Hux’s voice, but not a hint of remorse or uncertainty. “I will destroy worlds. An entire system at once. I’m still working out the first target.”

Kylo said nothing. For a moment, he thought nothing. Everything made sense now, the reason why the Force had placed Kylo in Hux’s path, not to cement Kylo’s monstrosity but to prevent Hux’s. Kylo released a shaky breath. Hux was trying to catch his eye, and Kylo avoided it by kissing his cheek again, not wanting Hux to see the revulsion there. He knew it would cut deep even though it was what Hux expected. Kylo brought one hand up, laying it gently on the back of Hux’s neck, cradling him. When Ben Solo had been young, his mother still woke from sleep screaming, remembering the feeling of all her home planet’s souls winked out at once, their Force signatures ripped out of the galaxy, only cold emptiness left. A void.

Kylo held a void in his arms right now. Kylo’s lips were pressed against warm skin, and there was a pulse in his ears and hot respiration puffing against his neck, but Hux’s mind was a void. Kylo could easily see this moment through his mother’s eyes. This man, an aberration, brought into existence by accident and bent on spreading his own black emptiness. How many lives did a system hold? Trillions, easily, in the Core Worlds Hux despised.

“Did that do the trick for you?” Hux asked.

Kylo’s heart was pounding. He knew Hux felt it; one of Hux’s hands had slipped down on his chest, pressed into his robe just above the working muscle. There was no point in lying, but Kylo had learned from the best. He simply wouldn’t lie.

“I love you.”

Hux laughed, and it was almost a sob. He composed himself quickly, and nudged his face against Kylo’s, encouraging Kylo to meet his eyes. Kylo still faltered.

“Is it enough?” Hux asked him.

_ Enough to save us? Enough to doom the galaxy? _

Kylo didn’t know.

_ Enough for tonight?  _ “Yes.” And then Kylo could meet Hux’s challenging stare. “It’s enough.” The Light in his soul was eclipsed almost completely, a faint and struggling glimmer of it sparkling behind the seething frost of the Dark. Kylo could feel Kuruk’s attention on him suddenly, and wondered what it was she saw, which of her visions had just solidified into prophecy. He hoped it was the beach, but if not, Hux was in his arms now. Somehow that was worth more than all the flickering possibility in the universe.

Hux tilted his face and kissed Kylo, grazing his lower lip gently with the sharp edge of his teeth to make him shiver.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We made it! If you read this all then thank you lol.
> 
> My personal headcanon for this little writing exercise is that starting now we go into the movies, and the stress of the war / Snoke (who has picked up on Kylo’s attachment to Hux and Doesn’t Like It) makes them lash out at each other. Hux gets insecure after destroying the Hosnian System not because he has morals but because he’s afraid that it made Kylo love him less, especially now that Kylo’s obsessed with some girl. The movies play out as they did with the trash boys being dumb and not communicating (but ya know they were still fucking behind the scenes). Kylo and Hux essentially break up after the power grab in TLJ. Hux being the spy in TROS is totally an angry ex-boyfriend move. Kylo keeps chasing That Girl, so he isn’t around to force Hux (who thinks he has a lot less to live for now anyway) into a blast vest to prepare for the summons he knows is trouble from Pryde. Voilà Hux getting shot dead by Pryde. Kylo is so mad when they meet up in the afterlife (on the beach just like Kuruk saw) and swap death stories.

**Author's Note:**

> Guess who's reading Midnight Sun? Anyway, have some Twilight-flavored obsessive Kylo Ren.


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